


i love to hold you close (tonight and always)

by jaeson



Category: Produce 101 (TV), Wanna One (Band)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Alternate Universe - College/University, M/M, mentioned: Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-20
Updated: 2018-04-20
Packaged: 2019-04-18 01:36:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14202171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaeson/pseuds/jaeson
Summary: He doesn’t know how long he has been sitting on the floor with Daniel and Sungwoon, who are now wide awake as they stare at the – the thing with Seongwoo.“How did he end up here?” Daniel wonders out loud and Seongwoo turns to face him.“Do you think I would have a clue? I don’t remember most of yesterday, how would I know how the – the thing ended up here?” Seongwoo replies, frustration dripping from his voice. “And how do we even know it’s a he? For all we know, it could be a her!”





	i love to hold you close (tonight and always)

**Day 0**

Seongwoo sighs as he looks at the clock on the wall – twenty minutes more to go – and wishes for time to go by faster.

For the past half an hour, he has been zoning out of class, his leg jiggling up and down the more impatient and irritated he gets. He just wants the lesson to be over as quickly as possible because really, what sane professor decides to do actually important stuff the last day before summer break?

As a loud cry coming from the back of the lecture hall interrupts his thoughts, he can’t help but roll his eyes.

And who the fuck decides to bring a toddler to class with them?

“Can you stop moving your leg?” Daniel whispers from besides him all of a sudden, his hand landing on Seongwoo’s thigh and squeezing it gently. “It’s making me dizzy.”

“Sorry,” Seongwoo apologizes while worrying at his lips.

He tries to focus on what the professor is talking about, his fingers flying across the keyboard of his laptop as he listens and takes notes at the same time, and just as he thinks he can do it, just as he thinks that he can survive whatever time is remaining from this lecture, the kid at the back breaks through his concentration with a shriek.

“I fucking hate kids,” Seongwoo mumbles in frustration.

“Ey, don’t be like that,” Daniel smiles and pokes him on his cheek. “The kid is cute, have you seen it? It has big eyes and super cute tiny hands!”

“Have you actually taken a proper look at it?” he asks, eyebrows furrowing as he turns back to look at the kid, who is currently biting his mother’s hands. The poor woman looks like she could take a break, or well, various breaks. “Kids cannot be trusted, they are all tiny little demons!”

Daniel laughs, his eyes crinkling cutely as he leans onto Seongwoo and hides behind Seongwoo’s shoulder so that the professor won’t take notice of him not properly paying attention. Seongwoo intents on fighting the smile that is urging to spread across his lips but as soon as he hears another one of Daniel’s muffled laughs, it’s a lost cause and he is smiling stupidly too.

“There are only ten minutes left, okay? You can do it,” Daniel says in between giggles. “Just think of how wasted we will be going to be tonight and you’ll be fine.”

“Now that is a good motivation,” Seongwoo smirks and wiggles his eyebrows. “I have to stay strong for the alcohol and the beautiful human beings I could possibly bang today, am I right?”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Daniel agrees easily enough.

Seongwoo hums contently, just the thought of being able to unwind and forget all about this shitty day and college in general makes him happy.

The fact that he knows he will be spending most of it with Daniel and his friends is just a plus.

  


When Daniel and he arrive at his apartment after the lecture, Jisung, Jaehwan, Sungwoon and Minhyun are already waiting for them. They are all dressed up in some classy shirts and skinny jeans and he has to admit that his friends are all really hot.

No wonder most girls were head over heels for them.

“I hope the vodka is ready because I really need some right now,” Seongwoo exclaims right after toeing off his shoes.

“Rough day?” Minhyun asks with a smile as Jaehwan hands him a red solo cup.

“What do you think?” Seongwoo retorts with a bitter smile. “As if the fact we had to have various classes today out of all days was not enough, there was this poor girl with an evil ass toddler in each one of them. The kid wouldn’t stop crying or yelling – or doing any kind of noises, really.”

“Was it really that bad?” Jisung questions but this time he redirects the question at Daniel.

“Kind of?” Daniel shrugs and thankfully takes a beer from Jaehwan. “I guess he is also just grumpy. He had to wake up at six a.m. on a Friday after all.”

“Makes sense,” Jaehwan agrees. “But can we all just forget about Grandpa here and get the party started?”

“Daniel and I have to get dressed up first, Jaehwan,” Seongwoo reminds him. “I’m sure you can wait a little bit before going full drunk Jaehwan right?”

“Excuse me, what is that supposed to mean? I have a high tolerance, you have to wait a few hours before I even feel the effect of alcohol on me,” Jaehwan replies indignantly and as if to prove a point, he downs a shot of vodka – Malibu? – who knows, really. “And drunk Jaehwan is fun, okay?”

“Not when he is puking all over my shoes,” Sungwoon denies.

“Did you really have to expose me like this? Should I expose you and your passing out during - ?” Jaehwan starts but gets cut off by Sungwoon throwing himself at him, one of his hands on Jaehwan’s mouth preventing him from actually spilling the beans.

“Hyung,” Daniel says, his hand now tugging gently on Seongwoo’s forearm.

“Hm?”

“Let’s get changed, now?” Daniel suggests with a smile. “We still have a lot of stuff to prepare and we should get it done soon.”

“Yeah, sure,” he nods.

  


By the time they’re done with preparing everything – cleaning Seongwoo’s apartment, setting up the drinks in the kitchen, making sure all of the fragile or easily broken things are well hidden and donning Seongwoo’s only guest bedroom with washed but old sheets – it’s already ten.

It’s just on time because right afterwards, just when Jisung finally ends their misery and announces “we are done!”, the first few guests are already knocking on their door.

  


When the clock strikes 1 a.m., the party is on full swing.

There are countless of people dancing in Seongwoo’s make-shift dance floor, he has seen some people coming out of the bathroom and guest bedroom with hickeys all over their necks and most of the patrons visiting his home are definitely drunk.

Seongwoo and the rest are almost the same, really.

Sungwoon is somewhere on the dance floor with a petite, pretty brunette he apparently knew from his political sciences class, Jisung is sitting comfortably on Minhyun’s lap as he rambles on and on about how happy he is to finally get a break and be able to go on vacation next week, Jaehwan is in the corner with a guitar in his hand as he sings loudly and, for once, very off-key and Daniel…. Seongwoo actually hasn’t seen Daniel for a while.

He drunkenly stumbles to the kitchen, greeting a few of his dance major friends on the way, and gets a new and unused cup since he had lost his somewhere in the middle of the dancefloor.

As he stares at all of the different drinks on the counter, someone suddenly wraps their arms around him.

“Hyu ~ ng!” Daniel yells loudly, right into Seongwoo’s ear. “I’ve missed ya!”

“I missed you, too!” Seongwoo laughs and pours himself whatever is inside of that weird looking white-brown bottle and a bit of orange juice.

He turns around in Daniel’s embrace and sips on his cup.

Seongwoo grimaces when he notices that whatever he has mixed together tastes absolutely disgusting and then, when Daniel gets curious as to what it is, lets the younger try.

Before he knows it, they are having a very heated discussion on why Seongwoo’s drink sucks.

Daniel argues that it’s probably the orange juice – “because orange juice is always disgusting, Seongwoo!” – and Seongwoo is of the opinion that no, the alcohol must be the thing that’s off, no orange juice can taste this bad.

“Hey, you two!”

Both of them whip their heads to the door, Daniel taking a step back as he squints to make out who is yelling and pointing (?) at the both of them.

“You have to come right now!” Jaehwan cackles.

Jaehwan jumps in between the both of them and links his arms around theirs. He drags them to the living room where Jisung, Minhyun and Sungwoon are already waiting, all of them obediently sitting on the floor in a corner of the room.

“We are…” Jaehwan pauses to giggle dramatically. “going to get wasted tonight!”

Sungwoon and Daniel enthusiastically “woo” as Daniel sits down on the floor. Seongwoo doesn’t really trust whatever Jaehwan is seemingly planning but he is way too drunk to care or speak out his doubts so he also just takes a seat on the floor, sandwiching himself between Minhyun and Jisung.

Jisung rests his head on Seongwoo’s shoulder the moment Seongwoo has settled down.

For a moment, Seongwoo wonders if Jisung is going to fall asleep right then and there but to his luck, Jaehwan startles all of them awake when he noisily puts a bottle of tequila and a few shot glasses in the middle of their circle.

“Today’s party game is…” Jaehwan uses the window sill behind him to fake the sound of drum rolls. “Take a shot every time you see a couple making out, for every shot you don’t take, you have to do a dare!”

“You want us to get killed, don’t you?” Minhyun snorts.

“No!” Jaehwan denies with a giggle that’s more high-pitched than normally. “Just black out drunk!”

**Day 1**

The first thing Seongwoo does when he wakes up in his bathtub with yesterday’s clothes still on is to groan and complain about the head-splitting headache that he is currently nursing.

He has to blink softly and a few times more than he’d like before he can actually open his eyes without feeling like death is coming for him. Seongwoo proceeds to groan again, this time even louder, when he sees the mess that is his bathroom – he thinks he can even see a few used condoms scattered on the floor which is, to say the least, disgusting.

Seongwoo tries his best to stand up without breaking any of his bones and he mostly succeeds, although it hurts like a bitch when he accidentally bumps his head on the showerhead that is way lower than he remembered it to be.

“Jisung? Daniel?” Seongwoo calls out as he carefully steps out of the bathtub and onto a pile of red solo cups. “Minhyun? Jaehwan? Sungwoon? Anyone?”

Nobody answers him so he sighs and proceeds to walk to the living room, cringing at the mess that it is – there is trash everywhere, snack, foods and drinks all over the floor, Seongwoo thinks he can even see puke somewhere in the pot of his fake plant – but he can’t help but laugh when he sees Daniel passed out cold in the middle of it and Sungwoon sleeping on the couch.

He is about to wake them up with a loud yell when he hears an almost deafening cry coming from his bedroom.

His eyebrows furrow immediately because it’s not a normal, coming-from-an-adult cry, no, it sounds just like how the kid yesterday had cried. Seongwoo is not getting a good feeling from this.

Seongwoo quickly goes over to Daniel and tries to shake him wake.

“Daniel,” he says, shaking him harder after three failed attempts. “Daniel, wake up!”

“No…” Daniel whines and tries to turn around, fumbling with his hands and almost hitting Seongwoo right in his face. “I want to… sleep… Let me sleep!”

“Dude, seriously, I’ll let you sleep however much you want afterwards but you have to get up!”

Daniel seems to notice the panic in Seongwoo’s voice because he cracks one eye open and then, when realization finally dawns upon him that yes, Seongwoo seems to be scared shitless, he is sitting up right away, eyes wide open as he worriedly looks at Seongwoo.

“What is it?” Daniel asks.

“I – I heard something weird,” Seongwoo admits, biting his bottom lip.

“Elaborate that, please,” Daniel replies, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes and afterwards taking a hold of Seongwoo’s hand, his thumb comfortingly rubbing circles on his skin.

“It sounded like… a baby crying….,” he says, sheepishly looking down at the floor.

“A baby? I thought you heard a thief or something, you scared the fuck out of me!” Daniel protests, lying back down on the floor grumpily and closing his eyes. “I’m sure it’s a kid from the neighbors or something. Go back to sleep.”

“No, Daniel, seriously, I think it came from my – “ he is, once again, interrupted by crying and fuck, it is definitely coming from his bedroom. “Did you hear that?”

“I didn’t,” Daniel grumbles, curling in on himself as he tries to go back to sleep.

“I didn’t,” Seongwoo repeats mockingly as he pouts, unsure of what to do if he doesn’t even have the back-up of his best friend.

He tries to wake up Sungwoon but it’s a lost cause as Sungwoon almost kicks him in the balls when he attempts to.

Seongwoo tries to talk himself into believing that maybe he is just going crazy and the cries he hears every few minutes are just hallucinations – maybe he just drank too much last night and had finally somehow managed to damage his brain, right?

That’s totally plausible!

Maybe Daniel was right and his only neighbor, who is male, single and very gay, had just suddenly gotten a child – maybe he just had to take care of it or something.

Yes, yes.

That was it.

But somehow, even if he tries to talk himself into believing that there is absolutely no way in hell that there is a fucking baby, in his house, there’s an insistent and very nagging feeling that there is. So after ten minutes of aimlessly going back and forth in the living room, he eventually still ends up in front of his closed bedroom door.

“You can do this,” Seongwoo tells himself, reaching out for the door handle. “It’s probably only your mind playing tricks on you, just – just check it out to reassure yourself, yes, that’s right.”

He takes one last deep breathe and opens the door, carefully peeking into the room.

The first thing that catches his attention is that his bed is, thank God, still intact and doesn’t seem to be used at all. The second thing he notices, though, is way more important.

From behind his bed, he can make out someone’s clothes - and hey, those are Jaehwan’s shoes! - lying on the floor.

He sighs in relief, Jaehwan is probably just lying on the floor and watching some stupid videos of babies crying on his phone or something. God knows that if any of them would do that, it’d be Jaehwan.

Seongwoo opens the door fully and steps in, carefully skipping to where he suspects Jaehwan to be lying with a grin on his face.

“Jaehwan, what are you doing?”

He expects Jaehwan to look at him and respond with something stupid like “oh, you know, just hanging out on your floor!” but to his surprise, it’s not exactly Jaehwan who looks back at him.

“What the hell?”

  


He doesn’t know how long he has been sitting on the floor with Daniel and Sungwoon, who are now wide awake as they stare at the – the thing with Seongwoo.

“How did he end up here?” Daniel wonders out loud and Seongwoo turns to face him.

“Do you think I would have a clue? I don’t remember most of yesterday, how would I know how the – the thing ended up here?” Seongwoo replies, frustration dripping from his voice. “And how do we even know it’s a he? For all we know, it could be a her!”

“Good point, do you think someone left it here?” Sungwoon asks.

“Who the fuck would leave that at a college party?” Seongwoo retorts. “And if they did, we definitely need to call the police.”

“We have to call them, anyway,” Daniel mutters. “I mean, we can’t keep it, right?”

“Of course, we can’t keep it!” Seongwoo yells, startling the thing who then looks at him with watery eyes and a frown. “Don’t look at me like that, we are not keeping you, okay? You have to go back to the people you belong to – I mean, I’m sure they’ll be searching for you by now! Maybe they will come and pick you up soon or – “

“Guys,” Sungwoon suddenly interrupts Seongwoo. “Something is fishy.”

“What? No shit, Sherlock,” Seongwoo deadpans but Sungwoon only shushes him as he goes nearer to the thing and inspects it closely. The thing stares back at Sungwoon with curious eyes. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“This – this is not just any – any baby,” Sungwoon suddenly says as he comes back to sit on his place next to Seongwoo. “That is… That definitely is Jaehwan!”

“What the fuck are you on?” Daniel asks, shock evident in his voice. “That cannot be Jaehwan!”

“Look at it,” Seongwoo and Daniel turn to look at the thing – the baby, both of their heads cocked to the side as they stare at it intently. “It is Jaehwan!”

Seongwoo has to admit that the baby resembles Jaehwan quite a lot, what with its big eyes and squishy cheeks. He even has the same mole under its chin like Jaehwan but there is no freaking way that it really is him, nope, no way.

“He is even wearing Jaehwan’s shirt!” Sungwoon points out.

Seongwoo’s eyes wander down to the baby’s body and true, that is Jaehwan’s shirt – he had bragged about getting this gift from Sewoon a while back, saying it was from a very good and qualitative brand and that it was right up his alley.

“That doesn’t have to mean anything,” Daniel replies. “Maybe Jaehwan, the little asshole, just wrapped it up because it was naked while drunk and then hightailed it out of here.”

“It sounds like something Jaehwan would do,” Seongwoo agrees with a nod. “He does love to flash everyone when he is drunk.”

They look at each other for a while before turning back to the baby – or well, technically it’s a toddler Seongwoo guesses, it looks like it could be between two or three years old, but since Seongwoo really has no idea how toddlers, or kids in general, work, he could be totally wrong too.

“There’s just one way to find out if this is Jaehwan,” Sungwoon suddenly blurts out.

Sungwoon catches Seongwoo’s eyes and then nods at the baby. Seongwoo’s brain ratters for a few minutes, trying to find out what Sungwoon means, and then when he finally does, he shakes his head vehemently.

“No way in hell!” Seongwoo screams, scooting towards Daniel, who only looks at them in confusion. “I’m not looking at that – that baby’s butt, it’s privacy breaching!”

“Someone’s has to do it though,” Sungwoon smiles sweetly. “And I’m not going to be the one.”

“It’s your theory though, it’s only fair that you do it,” Daniel counters. “What if it has pooped or something? Do kids their age even know how to properly go to the toilet?”

“No clue,” Sungwoon shrugs as he gets up. “But I’m not doing it, in fact, I’m going to go now! I totally forgot I had agreed to meet Kai and Taemin today. They’re probably already waiting for me in the studio.”

“You little fucker,” Seongwoo jumps up and runs after Sungwoon but it’s too late. Before he knows it Sungwoon is out of his front door with a teasing “goodbye, have fun buddies!”.

Seongwoo slumps his shoulders and slowly walks back to the bedroom, feeling his headache from before returning in full force as he sits back down next to Daniel, who drapes a comforting arm over his shoulder and squeezes it in reassurance.

“You can do it,” Daniel smiles sweetly.

If his smile wasn’t as cute as it is and if Daniel wasn’t his best friend, Seongwoo would have slapped him for being a little shit.

After he arms himself with lots of courage, he slowly starts to crawl towards the baby, putting on a smile on his face that he hopes doesn’t come off as absolutely creepy.

“Hello there, buddy,” Seongwoo greets, awkwardly waving.

The kid stares at him for a few second ere it laughs, its tiny arms stretching out and wielding about right in front of Seongwoo’s face – he yelps when the kid almost pokes his finger in his eye.

“Nose!” the kid exclaims happily.

“Yeah, this is a nose,” he laughs nervously and touches the kid’s nose too. “You also have a nose.”

The baby – toddler – kid tries to follow the line of Seongwoo’s finger and gets cross-eyed as he does so, Seongwoo laughs and has to admit that the kid looks kind of very cute like that.

“Hey, uhm, buddy, can I pick you up? I want to look at something,” Seongwoo smiles.

Seongwoo notices that the kid probably didn’t understand him by the way it’s only looking at him with intrigued eyes. He sighs but opens his arms, hoping that maybe he will understand like that – and hey, it works.

The kid stands up on wobbly legs and walks towards Seongwoo, giggling happily when he arrives and Seongwoo wraps his arms around him.

He, for some reason, gives the kid a kiss on the cheek, which once again makes him laugh, and then proceeds to carefully take off Jaehwan’s shirt. Seongwoo struggles for a bit to get the kid’s arms out of it but Daniel comes up from behind him and helps him out.

“Oh wow, that’s definitely a penis,” Seongwoo mumbles when, to his surprise, the toddler doesn’t have any diapers on.

“I told you it was a he!” Daniel cheers gleefully, which only earns him a glare.

“Is that really what’s important right now?” Seongwoo asks, it’s cute how the kid somehow copies his facial expression and raises an accusing finger at Daniel, making Seongwoo burst out in laughter. “Now buddy, before I look at your butt, anything you wanna say?”

“Ungry!” the kid shrieks. “I’m ungry!”

“Okay, don’t worry, we will feed you when we are done, okay?” Seongwoo assures him.

“Do you even have anything besides ramen in here?” Daniel questions with amusement lacing his voice. “I don’t think kids are supposed to eat that.”

“Shut up and concentrate, you asshole,” Seongwoo retorts.

He smiles at the kid before he gently turns him around. Seongwoo leans down to inspect the kid’s butt and fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, they are so completely screwed, what the fuck?

“It’s there!” he exclaims, standing up, his mouth wide open as he flails around with his arms. “Daniel, it’s there!”

“What? Really?” Daniel’s eyes widen in shock as he looks between Seongwoo and the kid.

“Yes!” Seongwoo screams. “It’s there – Jaehwan’s birth mark! It’s right there in between his butt cheeks, look!”

Daniel scrambles to take the kid in his arm and then lifts it up. The kid – Jaehwan – wiggles around in Daniel’s hands and Daniel has to tell him three times to “keep still” before he can actually look at the kid’s – Jaehwan’s, Seongwoo reminds himself – butt.

“It – it is there….” Daniel looks at him with a disbelieving look. “But I mean – there’s no way that – ey, Seongwoo, it’s impossible that…. Right?”

For a moment, Seongwoo notices how scared Daniel looks. His hands are trembling as he puts Jaehwan down and his lips are quivering too and fuck, Seongwoo is really glad that he is not the only one who is scared shitless.

“We – we need to call Jisung,” Daniel says and Seongwoo nods in agreement.

  


“So… if we hypothetically, just hypothetically,” Seongwoo bites on his thumb’s nail as he looks at Daniel, who is currently sitting on his kitchen counter and is feeding Jaehwan with yogurt, the only edible thing he had found in his apartment that wasn’t ramen or chips. “would have woken up with a baby, that turned out to be Jaehwan, in the morning, what would we have to do?”

“Ong Seongwoo, are you drunk again at only 12 p.m.?” Jisung asks, completely gobsmacked. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Well, you see, it’s just hypothetically,” Seongwoo bites on his lips now, waiting for Jisung’s answer impatiently. From the corner of his eyes, he can see Jaehwan happily taking the yogurt out of Daniel’s hand and throwing it onto the floor with a bright grin. “Oh, and what do you even need for taking care of say a two to three years old kid? Like, do they still need diapers? What do they eat? Do I need to buy them formula?”

“You… you aren’t kidding?” Jisung stutters.

Even though Jisung is miles away and they are talking over the phone, Seongwoo can hear how he is starting to understand that Seongwoo is not completely full of shit.

“Nope,” Seongwoo laughs awkwardly into the speaker. “Surprise?”

“I’m coming over with Minhyun, we will be there in ten minutes, please try not to die or kill Jaehwan,” Jisung informs him. “If this is a prank, just know that I’m going to rip you into pieces.”

Jisung hangs up on him right afterwards.

“So, what did he say?” Daniel questions.

Seongwoo laughs as he notices how some of the yogurt had somehow ended up on Daniel’s cheek. He stands up and walks over, licking his finger before he softly dabs at Daniel’s skin and successfully gets it off. He sucks the yogurt off his finger then and hums at how good it tastes.

“He is coming over,” Seongwoo tells him. “At least we will have one responsible adult on our side now.”

“Isn’t it sad how we aren’t responsible adults ourselves?” Daniel laughs.

“We can start being responsible by cleaning the apartment up,” Seongwoo smiles and gestures to the rest of the house that is still pretty much a mess. Jaehwan suddenly makes grabby hands at Seongwoo, who pats his head and then takes him in his arms. “Was the yogurt yummy, hm?”

“Yum, yum,” Jaehwan nods, his sticky hands taking a hold of Seongwoo’s hair and playing with it.

“You’re lucky I have to shower anyway or else I’d actually kill you,” Seongwoo says in the sweetest tone possible, making Jaehwan smile right back at him.

  


“Okay, so you actually weren’t kidding,” Jisung states.

He had come in just five minutes ago, already starting to ramble about how Seongwoo would owe him booze for life if this was actually a false alarm, only to stop at the sight of Seongwoo and Daniel cleaning up the bedroom while toddler Jaehwan was sitting on the couch, playing with one of the few plushies Seongwoo owned.

“It’s cute that you think I’d be creative enough to think of a prank like this,” Seongwoo says.

Both Minhyun and Jisung glare at him, not appreciating his humor in this kind of situation before they go back to staring at Jaehwan. Daniel, however, does laugh and it makes Seongwoo feel strangely proud.

“Is there a logical explanation for this?” Minhyun asks.

“Oh yeah, of course there is, it’s totally normal and logical for Jaehwan to have turned into a fucking baby,” Seongwoo deadpans for which he receives another glare.

“I mean, at least he is cuter than normally,” Jisung shrugs, settling down on the couch and playfully pinching Jaehwan’s cheeks. Jaehwan cries out in protest and swats his hand away, muttering something indecipherable at the same time. “But he is still a brat.”

“I don’t think that will ever change,” Daniel laughs.

They stay silent for a few minutes, Minhyun and Jisung observe and interact with Jaehwan and Seongwoo and Daniel dedicate their time to cleaning up the rest of the apartment – thankfully the mess had looked like more than it actually was and they had been able to tidy up most things in only an hour, Jaehwan had helped too, running around and throwing trash into the plastic bag while giggling like a mad man.

“We need to make up a plan,” Jisung suddenly says, getting both of Daniel and Seongwoo’s attention. “We need to turn – turn him back, I guess? Or whatever it’s called.”

“For that we would need to know how the fuck he turned into a baby in the first place,” Seongwoo sighs. He grabs Daniel’s hand and then tugs him towards the couch. They settle down on the couch that’s right in front of Jisung and Jaehwan immediately wriggles out of Jisung’s lap and runs towards them, comfortably sitting down between the two of them. “I don’t even know how this is possible, really.”

“Me neither but I’m sure we will be able to fix this,” Minhyun smiles reassuringly.

“What if we can’t though?” Daniel asks. “What if Jaehwan stays like this forever? None of us have a clue how to take care of children, I mean, we are lucky that we even had something besides alcohol here.”

“We will worry about him not turning back when the time comes, for now we need to figure out what happened,” Jisung tries to calm him down. “I will call up some of the kids that showed up yesterday, ask if they saw something weird happening. Do you guys remember anything?”

“Nope,” they answer in unison.

“Bibi,” Jaehwan suddenly jabs Seongwoo in the ribs frantically. “Bibi!”

“What? What do you need?” Seongwoo can feel himself panicking as Jaehwan starts to nervously fidget in his seat, repeating the word “bibi” again and again. It takes another thirty seconds of Jaehwan’s lips quivering and Jaehwan poking Seongwoo until Jaehwan points at his willy. “Oh shit.”

He stands up hurriedly and takes Jaehwan in his arms but still holds him at an arm’s length away from himself and facing away from him as he runs around the apartment.

“Someone get the fucking door, please,” he yells as he notices that there is no way in hell he will get it to open by himself.

“Bibi now!” Jaehwan screams as Daniel scrambles up.

Seongwoo realizes that Daniel won’t make it on time so he rushes into the kitchen with Jaehwan crying, Daniel now behind him as he puts Jaehwan into the sink, a relieved sigh leaving his lips as he hears the distinct sound of Jaehwan peeing.

“I – uh – need paper to clean him up?” Seongwoo says to Daniel, who nods and runs out of the kitchen. “And it’s peepee, not bibi.”

“Peepee?” Jaehwan repeats, craning his neck to look at Seongwoo.

“Yes, peepee,” Seongwoo nods.

  


When Seongwoo comes back to the living room with a clean Jaehwan, Jisung and Minhyun can’t help but giggle at how much of a walking disaster Seongwoo looks like. Seongwoo just sticks his tongue out at them as he sits down on the couch again.

“We called Sungwoon, told him to bring some clothes his size for Jaehwan and to buy some groceries,” Jisung informs him. “It will hopefully be enough for today and tomorrow morning.”

“Toys,” Daniel says as he plops down next to Jisung. “He also needs some toys, he won’t be entertained by that old plushie for much longer.”

“We also need to decide who is taking care of him,” Seongwoo points out.

“That’s already decided though,” Minhyun laughs and gestures at Jaehwan, who is tiredly nuzzling into the fabric of Seongwoo’s shirt and holding tightly onto Seongwoo’s hand. “Jaehwan seems to like you the most.”

“Besides Minhyun has his internship this summer and I’m going to Japan next week, he can’t stay with us,” Jisung grins. “I’m sure you will have lots of fun.”

“No way in hell,” Seongwoo shakes his head vehemently. “I have my part-time job too, I can’t take care of him all on my own!”

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m sure Daniel would love to stay with you and take care of Jaehwan, isn’t that right?” Jisung turns to look at Daniel and taps his thigh. Jisung and Daniel look at each other and somehow they seem to be having a silent conversation with their eyes. “Daniel?”

“Y-Yeah, I’ll help,” Daniel nods as he tears his eyes away from Jisung. “What are best friends for, right?”

“The both of you are saying ‘right’ too much for my liking,” Minhyun deadpans. “Anyway, I’ll come by often and try to help out too, make sure the kid eats something besides microwave food.”

Seongwoo glares at him and pouts, he can cook more than microwaved food and he will make sure Jaehwan is the healthiest kid to ever grace this earth. He is about to tell as much to Minhyun when Jaehwan interrupts him.

“Ddeongwoo,” Jaehwan whines and tugs at him shirt. “Sleep!”

“Sleep?” he asks, confused.

“Too ‘oud!” Jaehwan protests, his eyes still closed as he babbles on.

“Do you want to go and sleep on the bed?” Seongwoo suggests and Jaehwan seems to understand, nodding. “Okay then, buddy, let’s go.”

Seongwoo carries Jaehwan to his room and then carefully lifts the blanket. He makes sure to put him down in the middle of the bed, putting pillows on each of his side so he won’t fall off the bed in the middle of his sleep.

“Sleep well,” Seongwoo says and once again, Seongwoo doesn’t know where it comes from but, he leans down and kisses Jaehwan’s forehead gently.

  


While Jaehwan sleeps, Jisung, Minhyun, Daniel and Seongwoo try to remember the night before.

They find out that Daniel and Seongwoo remember only up to Jaehwan’s drinking game, everything besides that is fuzzy and pretty much unrecognizable in their memories.

Minhyun and Jisung remember more – Sungwoon being dared to kiss the girl he had been with before, Jaehwan being the one to puke in the pot plant and Seongwoo giving Daniel a striptease before going on a ramble about how the whole thing was “entirely no homo, bro”.

They also know that they had left early, Minhyun before Jisung as Jisung thought of staying until the end to babysit them and put them to sleep.

In the end though, Jisung had left too at about 5 a.m., too tired of the constant loud music and the amount of drunk people. He had made sure, however, that everyone else knew that the party was over by unplugging the stereo before stumbling to catch a cab.

Jisung remembers also seeing Jaehwan, Daniel and Seongwoo hanging out with Woojin from the dance department and his friends, Daehwi and Jihoon, so he promises to ask them for more information the next day.

Seongwoo takes all the information in but it’s still difficult to wrap his head around everything – he is even confused about apparently having giving Daniel a striptease and about why the fuck it made him feel so embarrassed when he knows he had done a lot worse with other people.

The fact that somehow in the mess that was last night, Jaehwan had turned into a fucking toddler, still seems unfathomable to him.

He sighs, tiredly slumping against the couch.

For the nth time that day, he wonders what the fuck his life has actually become.

  


“Uncle Sungwoon is here!” Sungwoon calls out happily. “I have dinner for my babies!”

Seongwoo gives him the stink eye when he catches sight of Sungwoon, still not forgiving him for leaving Daniel and him to deal with the whole “Jaehwan is a kid” mess.

Sungwoon just smiles saccharinely sweet at him and puts down the ten bags – Seongwoo isn’t even sure how he is carrying them all – he has with him in a corner of the living room, only putting the plastic bags with take-away on top of the little desk between the couches.

“Don’t look at me like that, Seongwoo,” Sungwoon whines. “I even brought your favourite Chinese food.”

“I still hate you,” Seongwoo mumbles, opening the bag.

“Me too,” Daniel chimes from where he is sitting next to Seongwoo.

“Whatever,” Sungwoon waves them off and hugs Jisung tightly to his chest. “At least I have Jisung.”

“You wish,” Jisung laughs and shoves Sungwoon away. “I’m also on their side – how could you even leave these two idiots alone with a baby?”

“Excuse me?” Daniel and Seongwoo protest at the same time.

“We all know you can’t even properly take care of yourselves on a good day, I don’t know how he was expecting you to survive with Jaehwan alone,” Jisung explains. “I’m surprised Jaehwan is still alive.”

“Of course, he is still alive!” Daniel huffs and Seongwoo nods in agreement. “We take care of him very well, okay?”

“You called me less than an hour after finding him, Daniel,” Jisung counters, pointing an accusing chopstick at them. “If I hadn’t come over, you’d probably still be sitting with Jaehwan in front of you with no clue of what to do!”

“M-Maybe but the point is that we did a good job,” Daniel mutters under his breath.

“Whatever,” Jisung rolls his eyes.

They eat in silence afterwards – although they hadn’t done much besides looking after Jaehwan and cleaning, it felt like almost a century had gone by instead of a day, Seongwoo could already feel the exhaustion seeping through his bones.

Seongwoo is in the middle of taking a bite from his sweet-sour chicken when he hears Jaehwan crying loudly inside of his room. He sighs and closes his eyes, willing himself to not get frustrated.

“Don’t worry,” Daniel pats his shoulder, setting his food down and standing up. “I got it this time.”

Seongwoo smiles gratefully at him and then watches as Daniel disappears into the room, already calling Jaehwan’s name in a cutesy voice.

A few minutes later, the crying stops and Daniel comes back with Jaehwan clinging tightly onto him. Daniel sits down with Jaehwan still in his arms and Seongwoo observes with amusement how he tries to eat using only one hand.

When the piece of chicken Daniel is trying to eat falls off from between his chopsticks for the third time already, Seongwoo sighs and picks it up for him, feeding him.

“Thank you!” Daniel smiles brightly.

“Niel,” Jaehwan calls out and points at the food. “Yum?”

“Yes, it’s very yummy, do you want to try?” Daniel asks and Jaehwan bops his head up and down excitedly. “Okay, buddy, should we ask Uncle Minhyun over there to cut some chicken and veggies for you, hm?”

Minhyun doesn’t protest and proceeds to cut the chicken in tiny little pieces.

“Jaehwan-ah, say ‘ah’!” Minhyun sing-songs. Jaehwan opens his mouth and then happily munches on the chicken piece, clapping with his hand at how much he likes it. “Did you like that? Do you want more?”

“’es, please!” Jaehwan nods eager for more food.

 

After dinner, all of them settle down on the couch and decide to put on a cartoon movie for Jaehwan, who after eating was increasingly getting more bored.

Even throughout the movie, Jaehwan keeps changing his seat and running around the apartment, not managing to stay still for more than a few seconds before he speeds off somewhere or is begging for one of them to play with him.

In the end, Seongwoo picks him up and asks Sungwoon for the clothes he had brought. He changes Jaehwan into some comfortable pajamas before he dumps him on Sungwoon’s lap with a toy.

That keeps him entertained until Sungwoon’s phone rings, his boss calling for him to ask if he could take on an extra shift at the bar since the other bartender had called in sick suddenly.

Sungwoon then proceeds to hand Jaehwan to Jisung, who narrows his eyes at him and flicks him the finger as Sungwoon leaves with a cheery goodbye.

Jisung convinces Minhyun to play with Jaehwan too, saying that Jaehwan seems to like Minhyun a lot.

Daniel and Seongwoo can’t help but cackle at how awkward Jisung, who is literally the person everyone assumed would be the best parent, seems to be with little Jaehwan, always keeping him at an arm’s length and smiling at him in a way that feels like it’s too forced.

After about an hour, Jisung has enough and tiredly asks Jaehwan to please go play with Daniel or Seongwoo now, announcing that he has to leave.

Jaehwan agrees easily to not playing with Jisung but doesn’t come to either of them, instead he holds tightly onto Minhyun and refuses to let go even when Minhyun says that he, too, has to go because he lives in the same house as Jisung.

“Mine,” Jaehwan repeats over and over again.

Seongwoo has to pry off his little but surprisingly strong fingers from Minhyun’s arms so that Minhyun can even get up to put on his shoes.

He distracts Jaehwan by playing hide and seek while they get ready to leave and when the time comes, he makes Jaehwan bow and say goodbye to Jisung and Minhyun, who coo about how cute Jaehwan is.

Daniel then joins them while playing – the big idiot gets competitive sometime in the middle of the game and decides that it’s a good idea to hide inside of the little space between Seongwoo’s closet and the wall.

It had taken both, Jaehwan and Seongwoo, tugging on him with all of their force (Seongwoo admits little Jaehwan looked cute with his face all scrunched up in concentration and his tiny hands pulling at Daniel’s hand) to get him out of there again.

It’s almost 11 p.m. by the time they stop playing the game and both Daniel and Seongwoo crumble in a heap of exhaustion onto the sofa. Jaehwan, however, still seems to be as lively as hours before as he begs for them to play just one more round of hide and seek.

Daniel tries to refuse but then Jaehwan somehow manipulates him to play the last round.

It doesn’t take long for Daniel to find Jaehwan, who had hidden under one of the chairs like Seongwoo suggested him to, but again, Jaehwan refuses to stop playing.

“You promised it would be the last round,” Daniel reminds him. “It’s time to go to sleep, anyway.”

“I ‘on’t wanna sleep!” Jaehwan protests. “Wanna play!”

“But it’s late, Jaehwan,” Seongwoo reminds him. “Seongwoo and Daniel need sleep, too, so we can play lots and lots with you tomorrow. If we don’t sleep, we can’t play.”

“Can’t… play?” Jaehwan murmurs. “No play?”

“No playing if we don’t get to sleep,” Seongwoo nods. “So why won’t we go to sleep, hm?”

He waits for Jaehwan to answer but the reply he expects never comes, instead Jaehwan’s lips start to wobble.

Seongwoo feels panic starting to rush through his entire body as he watches Jaehwan get teary eyed, his little hands clenching into fists as he looks at Seongwoo like he had killed his most beloved pet.

Suddenly, Jaehwan bursts into tears, plopping down on the floor.

“W-What do we do now?” Daniel questions, already getting back up and heading towards Jaehwan. “Should we like… comfort him? Or let him cry?”

“I don’t know?” Seongwoo answers truthfully. “Comfort him?”

Daniel shrugs but immediately takes Jaehwan into his arms, patting his back and whispering soothing words into his ears. Seongwoo joins him by his side and caresses Jaehwan’s hair.

“We are going to have so much fun tomorrow, I promise!” Seongwoo says, trying to sound cheerful. “We are going to go grocery shopping and we are going to buy clothes for you and – and we are going to go to buy toys too.”

“Toys?” Jaehwan asks through his tears, sniffing.

“Yeah, toys!” he confirms, gently wiping away Jaehwan’s tears and taking a napkin from earlier to also wipe Jaehwan’s snot away. “A lot of toys!”

“Now?” Jaehwan’s eyes brighten up.

“No, tomorrow,” Seongwoo smiles.

“We will sleep now and buy them tomorrow, okay?” Daniel grins at Jaehwan, who looks between them.

“’ot now?” Jaehwan asks again.

“Yes, not now,” Daniel answers. “Tomorrow.”

It doesn’t take more than that before Jaehwan starts to scream and cry again, whining for toys and how he wants to play now too. Daniel mumbles a quiet “sorry” to Seongwoo before he proceeds to try and comfort Jaehwan again.

After almost half an hour of Jaehwan throwing a tantrum, Daniel passes a still crying Jaehwan to Seongwoo, who decides that his butt hurts way too much to still be sitting on the floor and gets up, bringing Jaehwan with him to his bedroom.

He puts Jaehwan on the bed before he throws the pillows onto the floor and lays down.

Daniel hovers awkwardly over them – Seongwoo realizes between all the wailing that Daniel had never actually spent the night in Seongwoo’s bed, always either passed out somewhere in the living room or in the guest bedroom.

“Lie down on the other side,” Seongwoo gestures with his chin to the bed.

Daniel seems to hesitate for a second before he settles down next to them. He stretches his arm out and pats it while looking at Seongwoo with a small smile. It instantly becomes a pillow for the three of them as Daniel and Seongwoo sandwich Jaehwan between them.

Jaehwan’s crying becomes quieter when Seongwoo turns the light off but it doesn’t subdue until another half an hour of Seongwoo and Daniel caressing his back and saying sweet nothings, calming him down as sobs wreck his whole body, passes by.

In the end, Jaehwan falls asleep before the both of them thanks to all of the crying.

He nuzzles his head into Seongwoo’s neck while holding tightly onto Daniel’s free hand, peacefully sleeping even though his whole face is still red from all the sobbing.

“I’m exhausted,” Daniel blurts out when he is sure that Jaehwan is sleeping deeply.

“Me too,” Seongwoo laughs quietly. “But I’m glad that I’m not alone. Thank you for staying with me, Daniel.”

“Always,” Daniel mumbles sleepily.

**Day 2**

When Seongwoo wakes up the next morning, it is to Jaehwan hugging his feet and Daniel having his nose buried in the crook of Seongwoo’s neck and his arms wrapped around Seongwoo’s waist.

Seongwoo laughs because heck, the two of them look so cute, what with Jaehwan’s adorable cheeks looking even squishier than normally since they’re plastered against Seongwoo’s legs and with Daniel mumbling incoherent things into his chest as he hugs him tightly, his hair sticking out every which way and his features looking lax.

He ponders whether he should wake them up and get breakfast ready or let them sleep a little more but the choice is taken away from him when Jaehwan stirs and wakes up in the blink of an eyes.

“Hello buddy,” Seongwoo smiles and beckons Jaehwan to him.

Jaehwan crawls towards him, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes and poking Daniel on the cheek so that he moves out of the way. He whines when he doesn’t succeed in waking Daniel up and Seongwoo chuckles at the look of utter annoyance on little Jaehwan’s face.

“Daniel,” Seongwoo reaches out to Daniel’s head and starts playing with the hair on Daniel’s nape. “You have to move, Jaehwan wants to lie here.”

Daniel groans but does as he is told, shuffling backwards slowly, his eyes still closed.

Jaehwan instantly takes his chance and throws himself on the now empty space next to Seongwoo, almost seeming as if he was scared Daniel would come back to take his place again.

“Did you sleep well?” Seongwoo asks Jaehwan.

“Yeah,” Daniel answers and Jaehwan nods at the same time, Seongwoo muffles his giggles behind his hand. “You?”

“I slept very well, too,” Seongwoo replies.

For the first time, Seongwoo notices that Daniel is actually adorable when he has just woken up, his face swollen from sleep and a huge silly smile on his face even though he has his eyes closed. He feels the urge to compliment him and tell him how cute he is – which is weird because that’s not the kind of friendship they have.

“Ddeongwoo,” Jaehwan looks at him with round eyes. “Eat?”

“Do you want some breakfast?” Seongwoo giggles and bops Jaehwan’s nose. Jaehwan scrunches his nose up at first but then giggles when Seongwoo does it again. “What do you wanna eat for breakfast?”

“Cereals for breakfast!” Jaehwan exclaims happily.

Seongwoo is surprised by Jaehwan actually stringing together an almost coherent sentence and proceeds to reward him by peppering his whole face with kisses, Jaehwan squeals happily at that and even tries to kiss Seongwoo, too.

Flash.

He blinks in confusion, seeing white dots in his vision as he suddenly turns to Daniel, who is looking at him with a sheepish grin and his phone in his hand.

“It just was too cute, I had to take a picture,” he explains, scratching the back of his neck. “Sorry?”

“Just don’t use the flash next time, I still have white spots dancing everywhere,” Seongwoo snorts. “Did the photo turn out well at least?”

Daniel nods contently and shows him the picture, which is really kind of adorable.

“Can you send it to Jisung?” Seongwoo says. “Just to show him how well we are taking care of our little Jaehwan here.”

“Sure,” Daniel smiles.

  


“Do you think we should buy stuff for Jaehwan first or go grocery shopping first?” Seongwoo asks while shoving a full spoon of cereal onto his mouth.

Jaehwan protests when Daniel turns towards Seongwoo and stops the spoon he was about to feed Jaehwan mid-way. Daniel apologizes cutely and then proceeds to feed him with a smile, Jaehwan gobbling down the cereals in a flash.

“I guess things for Jaehwan would be better,” Daniel replies, still distracted by having to feed Jaehwan. “So that in case we buy frozen food, it won’t melt and stress us out.”

“Makes sense,” Seongwoo agrees. “I’ll ask mom for her car and my sister for her baby seat, at least like that we won’t have to carry Jaehwan and all the bags. Hopefully he won’t make too much of a fuzz while we are out.”

“He seems to be in a good mood today, I’m sure we will be fine,” Daniel says.

  


“Jaehwan, please, please, please sit down,” Seongwoo pleads for the third time already.

His mom had been kind enough to drive the car to his house before his father picked her up in his and drove her back – he was also thankful that she didn’t ask too many questions about why he suddenly needed a baby seat – but ever since Daniel brought Jaehwan down, he has refused to sit down in the car seat and it’s really starting to frustrate Seongwoo.

“If you’re nice, I will buy you a very big, big toy,” Daniel promises, making Jaehwan perk up. “You can choose which toy you want, okay? It doesn’t matter how expensive it is!”

“Really? Big toy?” Jaehwan smiles. “Okay!”

Seongwoo thanks the heavens for the angel that is Kang Daniel and then buckles Jaehwan up, asking him twice if he really feels comfortable with the belt or if it was too tight.

The drive to the Lotte mall nearby is actually pretty quick and Jaehwan behaves well, the promise of a toy apparently having stricken the right chord. Daniel plays the DJ, mixing not annoying children songs with some of their favorites, even being nice enough to play a few ballads for Seongwoo’s sake.

When they arrive, Jaehwan immediately starts pestering them about the toy so they decide to hit up the toy store before anything else.

The second they walk in, both of them realize that it was a terrible idea to bring Jaehwan here.

He starts to run around the whole store, carelessly taking toys and throwing them into their basket before disappearing to get another toy. In the end, Seongwoo sneakily puts some back while Daniel distracts Jaehwan with flashy and expensive toys.

“I can’t believe I spent almost an entire paycheck on this, how will I pay my rent this month?” Daniel complains when they get out of the store.

Seongwoo only offers him a solitary pat on the back and an encouraging smile, mumbling an “you can do it, bro” before he dashes off with Jaehwan into the ice cream shop in front of them. He makes Jaehwan promise that he will eat a big lunch and then buys popsicles for the three of them – he thinks it’s totally worth his money when he sees Jaehwan and Daniel smile like lunatics while eating it.

“Where to next?” Daniel questions after they’re done with their ice cream.

“Hm, what about the clothing store?” Seongwoo suggests.

“I want to buy him super cool clothes,” Daniel beams at Seongwoo and then stretches his hand towards Jaehwan. Jaehwan looks at it, seemingly considering whether to take it or not before he accepts and holds Daniel’s hands. He then also takes a hold of Seongwoo’s and swings both of his arms. “Make him look super fashionable for once in his life. I’ll buy him lots of jeans and cute little shoes – oh, and definitely a leather jacket!”

“He is going to be the most good looking and fashionable toddler,” Seongwoo giggles.

Once they’re in the clothing store, it’s not only Jaehwan who goes crazy.

Both Daniel and Jaehwan run around the different aisles, looking at all of the cute and cool clothes in the boys’ section. Seongwoo just follows them quietly, amused at how much fun Daniel is actually having with this – “Jaehwan, this will look great on you! The ladies are going to love you! And the boys, too, of course!” – and also very much amused at how Daniel asks Jaehwan for advice – “Do you think the red or the blue shirt will look better on you, hm? Which one do you like better?”.

Seongwoo also sneakily takes pictures of them, mostly when Daniel decides to try on matching outfits with Jaehwan after he finds some similar outfits in the men and kids’ sections.

He sends them into their group chat with Sungwoon, Jisung and Minhyun – their reactions ranging from “they actually look like father and son, what the fuck?” to “I like the outfit with the leather jacket the most! Buy it!” and “Jaehwan will be so embarrassed once he is back to normal” - and also saves them in his ‘favorites’ album, just because they’re too cute.

Seongwoo stops thinking they are cute though when he is the one who has to pay way too much for their clothes and Daniel mockingly tries to cheer him up with a “you can do it, bro”.

  


After shopping for another two hours – they had bought a baby carrier, special skin sensitive diapers and about a hundred different things to baby proof the house – they finally enter the supermarket.

Daniel picks Jaehwan up and with Seongwoo’s help he puts Jaehwan in the baby seat of the shopping cart. Jaehwan wiggles around uncomfortably in his seat, pointing at his butt and saying gibberish to them. Seongwoo gets it though and puts one of Jaehwan’s newly bought sweaters under his butt so that it won’t be as uncomfortable.

“What do you think we should buy?”

“Vegetables, I guess,” Seongwoo answers with a shoulder shrug. “As long as Jaehwan is a kid, I guess we need to be actual grown-ups and eat healthily which means vegetables and fruit…. and more healthy stuff.”

“Okay, Seongwoo,” Daniel laughs. “We will buy ‘healthy stuff’.”

“What do you want from me? My diet normally consists out of ramen and instant food and oh, yeah, lots of take out. You should know about what’s good for your body with all the – the work out and diet plans you try out every month,” Seongwoo pouts.

Daniel stops and stares at Seongwoo, for a moment Seongwoo fears that he has said something wrong (although he wouldn’t know what) but then Daniel tears his eyes away from him and mumbles an “you have a point there” before he keeps going further into the supermarket in search for the vegetable and fruit aisle.

“Oh, by the way,” Seongwoo says while Daniel is in the midst of picking out the perfect avocado. “I wanted to ask since this morning but I kept forgetting.”

“Hm?” Daniel looks at him for a minute, signaling him that he is listening, before he goes back to what he was doing.

“I was wondering if you’d want to bring a few of your things to my apartment and… stay there for a while?” Seongwoo questions. He doesn’t know why he is suddenly feeling so nervous after asking Daniel that, it’s not like he is asking his girlfriend to move in with him – he is just suggesting it because he thinks it would be a hassle for Daniel to go back and forth between his and Seongwoo’s apartment if he is going to help him with Jaehwan. There’s nothing more to it. “I mean, it’s only for the time that Jaehwan is like that, just so we can take care of him better, you know?”

“Yeah, sure,” Daniel nods after a while, sending a smile his way. “When everything is settled, I’ll get some of my clothes over to your place, is that cool?”

“Yup, totally cool,” Seongwoo smiles, finally able to stop with his nervous fidgeting. “Are you done with your avocado picking now? I want to get some bananas, too, and apples – Jisung says that kids normally like those.”

“You can get them, I’ll watch Jaehwan and keep picking my avocados,” Daniel mocks him.

Seongwoo sticks his tongue out before going to get the fruits – he even takes some seedless grapes with him when he notices them next to the bananas.

Afterwards they head to the aisle with the sweets and Jaehwan’s eyes seem to double in size, his tiny hands seemingly reaching for everything he can get on them as he laughs happily.

“Jaehwan, you can only pick two sweets, okay? No more!” Seongwoo warns.

He thinks Jaehwan is about to start a tantrum again when his lips start to wobble and his hands turn into fists, he really is just holding his breath and mentally preparing himself for it, he can see Daniel literally doing the same damn thing, only for Jaehwan to just huff in annoyance.

“This!” Jaehwan points at some dinosaur-shaped chocolate cookies and then further down at what seem to be a knock-off version of M&M’s. “And this, please.”

“You said please, well done,” Daniel compliments him, patting his head.

As they walk through the supermarket, they pick up wet wipes, baby powder and more toiletries (they even get a super cute Spiderman toothbrush) for Jaehwan. Seongwoo also impulsively decides to buy some chicken and other types of meat just because he guesses that even though they are expensive as fuck, they are definitely needed for Jaehwan to grow up healthily.

“We should grab lunch in the mall before going to my house, don’t you think?” Seongwoo says as he looks at the various restaurants lined up in front of them while they wait in line to pay for the groceries.

“I’m not convinced,” Daniel acts as if he actually has to think about it, egging Jaehwan on to do the same expression he is doing. “Correction, we are not convinced.”

“I hate you,” Seongwoo mumbles before taking a hold of Daniel’s arm and blinking up at him with his best puppy eyes, enjoying how Daniel gapes at him and his cheeks start to redden. “Please, can we eat here? I’m hungry!”

Jaehwan giggles when Seongwoo starts to tug at Daniel’s arms. Daniel doesn’t say anything for a few seconds before he completely deflates and nods in defeat.

Seongwoo cheers loudly, taking Jaehwan’s hands and moving them up and down while he jumps around, singing about how they’re going to eat yummy food really, really soon. Jaehwan seems to be just as excited as Seongwoo, too.

  


They decide to go for pizza in the end.

Jaehwan sits down on Seongwoo’s laps and eats contently while Daniel and Seongwoo eat and joke around – sometimes they also stop talking just to coo at how adorable Jaehwan is.

“Even when he is a kid, he takes compliments well,” Daniel laughs when Jaehwan grins widely at him after Daniel calls him cute for the nth time and pinches his cheek. “I can’t believe he can actually be this adorable. Adult Jaehwan can’t relate.”

“I’m writing this down and telling him you said that,” Seongwoo teases.

Daniel rolls his eyes playfully and just goes back to eating.

  


When they arrive at home, it’s almost 4 p.m. and Jaehwan has fallen asleep in the back of the car.

“Do you want me to carry him up or do you want me to take the bags up?” Seongwoo asks as he gets off the car and opens the door for Daniel on his way to the back of the car.

“Would you even be able to carry all the bags up?” Daniel snorts.

“What do you mean? Of course, I would!” Seongwoo protests and fakes being mortally offended before he rolls up the sleeves of his shirt and flashes his biceps at Daniel, flexing them so they look better. “Can’t you see how strong I am?”

Daniel raises his eyebrows and seems completely unfazed by his display of strength.

“Fine, whatever,” Seongwoo huffs in annoyance and Daniel laughs at him. “Let’s see how well you can do it then.”

He opens the door of the backseat and carefully unbuckles Jaehwan, making sure not to wake him as he lifts him up from his seat and lets his head gently rests on his shoulder. Jaehwan reflexively wraps his arms around Seongwoo’s neck and buries more into his warmth.

Seongwoo kicks the door close and then waits for Daniel to have gathered all of the bags – and he feels slightly impressed at how Daniel manages to hold them all with both of his admittedly large hands – before he closes the trunk too. Daniel thanks him with a smile before heading up to the apartment.

The first thing Seongwoo does when entering the apartment, after struggling with opening the door thanks to having to handle the keys and at the same time not waking up Jaehwan, is lie Jaehwan down on the couch and cover him up with a baby blue blanket they had just bought for him.

“He looks so peaceful,” Daniel says, slinging an arm over Seongwoo’s shoulder and tugging him into his side. “Don’t you think we’d make great parents one day?”

“We’ve barely had him for twenty-four hours, I won’t feel like I’m going to be a good parent until he is back to being the normal Jaehwan and he actually survives being with us,” Seongwoo snorts. “But I’m sure we won’t be absolutely horrible parents.”

Daniel shakes his head while laughing and nuzzles his nose into Seongwoo’s hair before leaving for the kitchen with the excuse of having to organize the groceries.

Seongwoo wonders, when Daniel is out of sight, why his heart is suddenly beating erratically in his chest and why he notices a blush spreading all over his face after Daniel’s simple touch?

  


Jaehwan wakes up right before dinner time.

Daniel plays with him while Seongwoo tries to come up with something edible – he ends up cooking some simple spaghettis with tomato sauce, guessing that Jaehwan will enjoy it, which he thankfully does.

Then they settle down on the couch with Jaehwan, the both of them cheering every time Jaehwan decides to use one of his new toys. They play with his Lego blocks, Hot Wheels and the Barbie and Ken he had decided on opening for at least two hours before Jaehwan, still too exhausted from all the walking around, asks for them to go to bed with a cute and demanding “bed!”.

Just like the night before, Daniel and Seongwoo sandwich Jaehwan between them.

“Good night, Jaehwan-ah,” Seongwoo mumbles as he presses a kiss onto Jaehwan’s forehead. “Good night, Daniel.”

**Day 3**

Right after breakfast, Daniel and Seongwoo put Jaehwan in the living room with his toys and sit down on the couch, packing out all the stuff they had bought to baby proof the house.

“So… I think the first thing we should do is probably put in the safety plugs?” Seongwoo asks after reading through the first article that popped up when he had googled ‘how to baby proof your house?’. “Afterwards we can install all the door holders and attach the corner and edge guards?”

“Sounds about right,” Daniel agrees. “This will be totally exhausting, won’t it?”

“Yep,” Seongwoo sighs but stands up anyway. “We could always make it more fun, though.”

“How so?”

“We can bet on something,” Seongwoo wiggles his eyebrows. “The one who puts in more safety plugs than the other has a free wish? We can install the door handle together and then have another little competition for the edge guards!”

“With my wish, can I wish for you to do anything I want?” Daniel questions with a smile.

“Why are you calling it your wish already, asshole? I might win, too,” Seongwoo pouts, he notices how Daniel stares at his lips for a second too long before he shakes his head and looks Seongwoo in the eyes again. “But yes, anything.”

“Okay, I’m in,” Daniel nods.

They prepare all of the safety plugs by putting them on the table – Seongwoo has already scanned the living room and snickers because he obviously has the advantage of knowing where all of the unused plugs are – and then they make sure that Jaehwan is distracted by his toys to not cause any trouble while they run around the house.

“Let’s do this,” Daniel announces, rolling the sleeve of his long-sleeved shirt up.

Seongwoo licks his lips as he notices all the veins on Daniel’s arms. He had always been a fan of pretty hands and even more of a man with noticeable veins on their arms, he can’t believe that he hadn’t noticed before that Daniel had exactly that.

He wonders for a moment what it would feel like to touch them, to be able to hold Daniel’s hand and feel his long fingers intertwine with his own, how it would be to –

“Uh, Seongwoo?” Daniel waves a hand in front of his face and Seongwoo blinks in shock.

“Sorry, I just – I just spaced out for a second there,” he smiles goofily.

Daniel laughs but doesn’t say anything more, back to getting ready to probably kick Seongwoo’s ass while Seongwoo dies of embarrassment – what the fuck had he even been thinking about?

“Are you ready to go or are you in a daze again?” Daniel snickers.

“Very funny,” Seongwoo flicks him the finger. “We will start in 3 – 2 – 1!”

As soon as Seongwoo is done speaking, Daniel is already running into the bedroom while Seongwoo cackles, knowing that most of the unused plugs are in the kitchen. He leisurely walks to the kitchen and starts to put them all in, happily humming under his breath and counting how many he has done.

He sees Daniel again in the living room, he is frantically running around with Jaehwan, who was previously playing, following his every move and even giggling when Daniel almost trips face first into the wall because of a cord he hadn’t noticed.

Seongwoo quietly laughs too before disappearing into the entrance hall and putting two safety plugs in. Then he moves to the bathroom, feeling even more victorious when he discovers one more plug he hadn’t known about prior to this whole competition. He puts the final one by squatting down on the floor and reaching behind the little furniture with his towels in it.

“I’m done!” he yells.

“Me too,” Daniel replies instantly. “How many did you put in, huh?”

Daniel’s head is peeking into the room and Seongwoo can’t help it’s adorable how excited he gets at the simplest things.

“18,” he announces proudly.

“I won then!” Daniel cheers. “I got 21, I can’t believe you even have so many plugs in this tiny apartment.”

“W-What do you mean 21? There’s no way you…” Seongwoo denies.

“I got 9 in the bedroom and 12 in the living room, you had all of this extension cables there, I hit the jackpot,” Daniel explains with a huge grin on his face, his metaphorical tail wagging behind him. “You owe me a wish now, don’t forget!”

“Fine,” Seongwoo sighs. “Whatever, I still have the corner and edge guards.

(Spoiler: Seongwoo doesn’t win that either but it’s okay because Daniel makes it up by cooking some delicious chicken and stir fried noodles for Seongwoo and Jaehwan for lunch.)

  


“Maybe we should go to the park today,” Daniel suggests. “Jaehwan doesn’t seem to want to nap today and he will probably need to let out all of his pent-up energy.”

Seongwoo looks out of the living room window before agreeing, deeming it safe for them to go out – there is no single cloud in sight, the sky is a beautiful shade of blue and well, if he is honest, he just really wants to get some fresh air, too.

“Let’s get you dressed, buddy,” he smiles as he picks up Jaehwan. “Do you want to go to the park?”

“Park? Park!” Jaehwan repeats. “Make new friends.”

“Exactly, you’re going to make new friends today but you have to promise to behave well, okay? If you listen to Daniel and I well, I will read you a bedtime story.”

“Long story though!” Jaehwan insists with a serious look in his eyes.

“Yes, a very long one,” Seongwoo giggles.

  


As expected it is a very nice day out, the light breeze feeling refreshing against their hot skin.

Jaehwan runs into the sandpit as soon as they enter the park – Seongwoo had googled the prettiest and safest park in his neighborhood – and immediately starts babbling with a kid that seems about his age before they begin to play together.

Daniel and he observe him for a while before deeming it safe and settling down on a park bench nearby.

“Are you worried?” Daniel questions out of the blue.

“About?”

“About Jaehwan,” Daniel replies. “Whether he will turn back to normal, whether he will always stay as a kid, about what to do if he does stay as a toddler. Just… about this whole situation.”

Seongwoo ponders about the question for a bit – of course, he is a little worried.

There are so many things none of them – not even Jisung and Minhyun – know about kids. There are so many things they could be doing wrong, as of now they have only been googling things (“the kid is crying, what do I do?”, “What do I have to feed my toddler?”, “How long can tantrums be?”, etc., etc.) and they could be doing ten thousand things wrong.

Furthermore, they still have literally no clue what is going on, why Jaehwan had even turned into a toddler in the first place, how they can turn him back.

But as he looks at Daniel, who is already looking back at him, he feels himself worry a little less.

“Not really,” Seongwoo decides to say. “I mean, this is not normal and there are many things left to do, to find out but… but I think if anyone can solve this, if anyone can do it, it’s us.”

“Us?” Daniel asks.

“Yeah, us, you and me,” Seongwoo smiles up at him. “We’ve been handling this pretty well for now and maybe we will fuck up – okay, we will definitely fuck up – a lot of things along the way but we’ll manage. We can do it.”

Daniel seems to be taking in everything that Seongwoo is saying so Seongwoo decides to turn his attention back to Jaehwan, who laughs his very distinct high-pitched laugh at a kid, who is attempting to eat some of the sand, before running around the sandpit, chasing another kid.

“You’re right,” Daniel says then. “We are best friends after all. We can do this.”

Seongwoo nods at him and smiles but he starts to wonder why the word “best friend” suddenly doesn’t make him feel as excited or as happy as before. Instead it makes him uncomfortable, like it’s not the right term for them, for what Seongwoo feels is them.

  


Just as Daniel had expected, Jaehwan passes out as soon as they arrive home after he gets Seongwoo and Daniel’s good night kiss.

Daniel and Seongwoo, instead of going to sleep, decide to put on “Stranger Things” and have some time to themselves. They joke around, laugh and talk while watching the show, somehow inching closer as the night progresses and then deciding to share a blanket when the both of them get the shivers.

Seongwoo doesn’t know exactly how it happens but he ends up falling asleep on Daniel’s shoulder, only waking up in the middle of the night to get Daniel to share the blanket with him again.

**Day 9**

Seongwoo wakes up to Jaehwan shrieking and his phone ringing.

He blinks a few times, trying to make out what time it is and the reason for Jaehwan to be screaming in his face. Seongwoo muses, as he looks at the clock, that Jaehwan is probably just hungry and irritated at none of the adults having been awake at the time.

“I’ll be right there for you, buddy,” he mumbles sleepily. “Let me just get the phone, okay?”

Jaehwan calms down a bit, although he is still fighting on-coming sobs as Seongwoo takes him in his arms and hugs him at the same time he unplugs his phone from his bedside table and then starts raking his fingers through Daniel’s hair for him to slowly wake up.

“Hello?” he says after picking up and putting it on speaker for Jaehwan – and Daniel, when he is fully awake – to hear. “Jisung?”

“Hey Seongwoo, how are you doing?” Jisung replies. “I’ve been missing your photo updates, don’t tell me you actually killed Jaehwan in the two days you didn’t send us anything.”

“Jaehwan is here!” Jaehwan says happily, leaning much nearer to the phone than necessary.

“You heard the little man,” Seongwoo laughs. “What made you call after not wanting to babysit, hm? Aren’t you supposed to be on your way to Japan right about now?”

“I am, actually,” Jisung laughs. “I just did the check-in and security control but I have something to tell you, you might actually be really happy about it. Maybe you should treat me to dinner after you hear this.”

“Who is it?” Daniel grumbles, sleepily looking up at Seongwoo, who has to stop himself from cooing at the sight.

“Jisung,” he whispers.

“Uncle Jisung!” Jaehwan repeats as if to make it really clear to Daniel.

“Seongwoo? Are you there?” Jisung says.

“Yeah, sorry, just got a bit distracted,” Seongwoo apologizes. “We will see about your meal after you tell me what you’ve found out.”

“Well, you see, I asked Woojin if he remembered anything weird happening that night,” Jisung starts, the smile evident in his voice. “He actually did, asked if it involved a baby. I was really surprised that he knew about it so I asked how he did – I actually don’t know how he does but he said he’d bring Daehwi over to your place next week to explain.”

“I’m confused,” Daniel and Seongwoo say in unison.

“I see Daniel is listening to this conversation, too,” Jisung tells them. “Hello there, good morning.”

“Good morning!” Daniel yells into the phone, grinning contently when he hears Jisung complain about how loud he is being from the other line.

“Anyway, back to the topic on hand,” Seongwoo interrupts them. “How does Woojin know about the baby and why is he bringing Daehwi with him? When exactly is he coming?”

“Uh, well,” Jisung giggles nervously. “I have no clue.”

“Forget your meal, you’re not getting anything from me, Daniel and I should be getting treated for life by all of you for taking care of Jaehwan while you go on about your life!” Seongwoo protests.

“What he said,” Daniel agrees.

“Calm down, sons, I’m sure Woojin will clear the situation as soon as he comes,” Jisung says. “Just wait a little bit more, have patience and all that jazz. Oh – I have to board now, guys, have fun and send me more pictures of Jaehwan, the kid is adorable and I want to have blackmail material against adult Jaehwan.”

“Sure, goodbye, have a safe flight!” Seongwoo says before hanging up.

“I have no idea what the fuck is going on, it’s too early for this,” Daniel whines, resting his head on Jaehwan’s head, making his cheeks even squishier than normally.

“Cute,” Seongwoo blurts out as he softly pokes Daniel’s left cheek.

Seongwoo only realizes what he has said when Daniel stares at him for a tad bit too long for it to be normal. He feels himself starting to blush so he just awkwardly clears his throat and looks away.

“Breakfast?” Jaehwan stares up at Seongwoo with hopeful eyes.

“Yes, breakfast, that’s a good idea,” Seongwoo smiles and carefully gets up. “Let’s go and make breakfast!”

**Day 12**

This time, it’s Seongwoo who suggests going to the park.

Daniel agrees easily and he tells Seongwoo about how he wants to teach Jaehwan how to ride a skateboard – or well, since he is too small for it, how to sit on it while Daniel pulls on it.

The sky is just as clear and blue as the other day when they arrive at the park. This time they don’t enter the playground and instead walk further into it, stopping at a calm place where not many people seem to pass by.

“Okay, Jaehwan, you have to sit down, okay? You can’t move or else you’ll hurt yourself,” Daniel reminds Jaehwan, who is already impatiently wiggling on the skateboard, for the nth time.

Seongwoo watches amused how Daniel starts off by pulling on the string attached to the skateboard very softly, too scared of maybe going too fast. Jaehwan, however, seems to want anything except that as he urges Daniel to go quicker by pouting and pointing forward.

“Faster!” Jaehwan demands. Daniel obliges but it still doesn’t seem to be enough for Jaehwan. “Faster!”

Daniel tugs on it a little stronger as he also speeds up his space, Jaehwan giggling happily as he holds on tightly to the side of the skateboard. Seongwoo films them, films how Jaehwan keeps egging Daniel on to go quicker, films the panicked faces Daniel sends him when he isn’t sure if he really should quicken his pace.

It’s hilariously endearing.

 

“Why don’t you take a break, hm, Jaehwan?” Seongwoo says. “I bet Daniel can show you really cool tricks on his skateboard.”

“Really?” Jaehwan’s eyes start sparkling as he comes to a stop. He stands up and runs to where Seongwoo is sitting, climbing into his lap and settling down comfortably. “Jumps, high jumps?”

“Yes, didn’t you know? Daniel is the best skater in the whole country,” Seongwoo smiles.

Daniel glares at him – not too fond of Seongwoo’s exaggeration and what kind of expectations it makes Jaehwan have – but then sighs in defeat before playing along.

“If I jump really, really, really high with my skateboard, will you give me a big kiss?” Daniel asks.

Jaehwan nods vigorously, already looking at Daniel with eyes full of excitement and curiosity. Seongwoo, too, looks at Daniel with curiosity, wanting to see if he is still as good as he was back in high school when he used to skip classes and let Seongwoo give the teachers stupid ass excuses just so he could learn new tricks from the cool kids at the skatepark.

Daniel starts by warming up and riding the board around the bench, always waving at Jaehwan whenever he passes him by, and then he proceeds to actually do some really cool tricks – admittedly he is not as good as in high school but Seongwoo is still pretty impressed.

Jaehwan looks like he is too by the way he springs out of Seongwoo’s lap when Daniel comes to a halt in front of them.

“Did you like it?” Daniel asks, a bright smile on his face.

“Yes, loved it!” Jaehwan replies excitedly. “Teach me please!”

Something about the sight of Daniel, whose sweaty bangs are plastered on his forehead, laughing brightly as he hugs and kisses Jaehwan, seems to trigger Seongwoo.

He feels his heart beat speeding up in his chest as the whole world besides them disappear, all he sees and hears is Daniel.

Daniel, who smiles brightly with his whole being. Daniel, who is able to light Seongwoo’s heart on fire with the simplest of glances. Daniel who will probably be a great husband and father when he is older.

Daniel, who he wishes could be a great husband to him.

“Ddeongwoo!” Jaehwan’s shout completely pierces through his thoughts. “I want sandpit!”

“Oh, yeah? Let’s go then buddy,” Seongwoo smiles shakily as he gets up and takes a hold of Jaehwan’s hand.

“Are you okay?” Daniel asks, taking his skateboard in his hand and catching up to Seongwoo. He wraps a hand around Seongwoo’s shoulder and squeezes it softly. “You were pretty dazed, huh?”

“Yep, totally fine! You know me, I’m always zoning out,” Seongwoo tries to reassure him.

  


“Oh, by the way, can you look after Jaehwan on your own for a few hours?” Daniel questions as soon as they sit down on the park bench in front of the sandpit. “I need to go home and get some clothes. Toiletries, too. I can’t keep stealing your shampoo.”

Seongwoo laughs and nods.

“Sure, don’t worry about it, I’ll take good care of him. You should also use it to unwind a bit, have time for yourself,” he smiles.

“No, I don’t want that,” Daniel shakes his head.

“Why? Jaehwan and I have been sticking to you like glue for the past few days,” Seongwoo frowns. “Take this chance and do something fun, maybe go out to drink with your dance crew.”

“I don’t want to,” Daniel repeats. “I’d miss you guys too much.”

Once again, as Seongwoo looks at Daniel, who is smiling at him with a blinding smile, his heart starts to go haywire in his chest.

 

Seongwoo and Jaehwan have an okay afternoon without Daniel.

They play with Jaehwan’s toys and Jaehwan even helps Seongwoo cook by putting the ingredients for their vegetable soup in the pot and turning the stove on.

It’s nice but it’s obvious that something – someone – is missing.

Jaehwan has trouble falling asleep when he notices that Daniel is not there yet at his usual bedtime and Seongwoo soothes and tires him out by reading some fairytales to him, inserting their own names to make them more believable and funnier.

By the time he hears Daniel shuffling into the bedroom, Jaehwan is already sleeping and Seongwoo is also pretty much asleep.

Daniel, instead of going to his usual side of the bed, shakes Seongwoo’s shoulder.

“Scoot over,” he says with a gentle voice.

Seongwoo grumbles and sleepily complains but still does as told, moving Jaehwan to the edge of the bed and putting pillows behind him so that he doesn’t fall out of the bed before he himself scoots to the middle of the bed.

Daniel slips in under the sheets next to him and Seongwoo turns around to face him.

“Did you get everything you needed?” he unconsciously wiggles closer to Daniel, seeking out his warmth.

“Yeah,” Daniel replies, obviously feeling tired, too. “I missed you.”

“We missed you, too,” Seongwoo answers. “Jaehwan missed you a lot, he had trouble falling asleep, had to read him four fairy tales to get him to sleep.”

“’m sorry,” Daniel mumbles as he puts a hand on Seongwoo’s waist and pulls him closer. From all the previous nights together, Seongwoo automatically tucks his head under Daniel’s chin and buries his nose into Daniel’s chest. “I’ll make it up by treating you to ice cream.”

“Okay,” Seongwoo agrees.

“Good night,” Daniel mumbles before the both of them drift off to sleep.

**Day 15**

“Daniel, I’m going to work now, okay?” Seongwoo calls from the entrance hall.

Jaehwan comes running to him and hugs his legs, crying about how he doesn’t want Seongwoo to leave – if he is honest, Seongwoo doesn’t want to leave either, he’d much rather spend his day with Daniel and Jaehwan playing some stupid games, going to the park or just sitting on the couch, but he doesn’t have any other choice.

“I will bring you something yummy to eat, dinner and dessert, I promise, so be nice and listen well to Daniel, please,” Seongwoo says while squatting down and cupping Jaehwan’s adorable cheeks.

He wipes Jaehwan’s tears away and kisses his nose lovingly before getting up and going through the door.

  


The whole day, the only thing Seongwoo has on his mind is how Daniel and Jaehwan are doing without him. He knows it’s stupid to worry about them, Daniel has been great with Jaehwan, even better than Seongwoo on most days, but he just hates the feeling of missing out on spending time with them.

Which is why he is so much happier than usual when his shift at the coffee shop finally ends and he is allowed to go home.

As promised, he picks up dinner and dessert on the way – this time he had opted to try out the new vegan restaurant Daniel had mentioned he wanted to try a few days ago – but as he is just a few minutes away from home, he gets worried.

Daniel hasn’t been picking up any of his calls ever since he got off work, he hasn’t texted him back either. He guesses he could very well just be playing around with Jaehwan or maybe he could also be too distracted watching TV to look at his phone, but something just doesn’t feel right. Seongwoo wonders if this is how his mother felt every time she had to go out for work and either leave them alone in the house or with his dad.

Seongwoo rushes home, walking a bit more hurriedly than normally, and gets there in record time.

When he opens the door to the apartment, he immediately yells “I’m home!” but to his surprise there is no response.

His frown deepens and his worry increases as he toes off his shoes and goes into the kitchen, dropping the bags with take out on top of the counter as he goes to check out his bedroom. Jaehwan and Daniel are also not there and he feels himself starting to actually feel scared about what might have happened to them or where they could be.

His worries, however, soon vanish when he sees the two of them on the couch.

Seongwoo fully steps into the living room and smiles at the sight in front of him – Daniel is slumped on the couch, the TV remote still in his hand and a cartoon playing on the television with Jaehwan curled up on his chest.

They both look utterly at peace.

His smile widens when he sees how Daniel has his arm protectively wrapped around Jaehwan’s small torso and he decides to take his phone out and snap a picture, which he then sends to the group chat with “aren’t they cute?” before he pockets it again and walks towards them

“Hello there, buddy, it’s time to wake up for dinner,” he whispers and he leans down to kiss Jaehwan’s forehead, smiling when Jaehwan stirs after hearing his voice.

Out of habit, or maybe pure want, he moves upwards and is about to also kiss Daniel’s forehead when realization hits him and he stops dead in his track, lips still puckered and eyes wide, starts to panic about why the fuck he would even have the urge to kiss Daniel – his best friend since diapers!

He looks down at Daniel, only to realize that Daniel is already looking back at him and that, fuck, their faces are way too close to each other.

“Don’t – Don’t I get a wake-up kiss too?” Daniel asks, a light red hue on his cheeks.

“Uh – I – I don’t even know why I – I’m,” Seongwoo stutters out unintelligently, not moving away or stepping back or anything that could save him from this oh so awkward silence.

Seongwoo ponders for a few seconds about what he should do but somehow his body decides on his own and he is leaning forward, his lips pressing a soft, chaste kiss on Daniel’s forehead. He steps back afterwards and immediately scrambles off into the bedroom with the excuse of having to change out of his sweaty clothes.

He slams the door shut behind him and leans against it, his heart hammering wildly in his chest.

What the actual fuck?

**Day 18**

“Daehwi, say you’re sorry,” is the first thing Woojin says when Seongwoo opens the door of his apartment for them, Jaehwan in his arms.

“I’m sorry,” Daehwi parrots.

Seongwoo is very confused but decides to not comment on anything and just let them in. He leads them to the living room where Jisung, Minhyun, Sungwoon and Daniel are already waiting for them and then asks if they want anything to drink. Woojin refuses politely, saying that they’ll be gone quickly. He just shrugs and sits down on the couch next to Daniel.

“So…. Are you guys going to start explaining or?” Sungwoon raises his eyebrows after at least five minutes of awkward silence. “I mean, we can also just start with some small talk if you want?”

“No need,” Woojin waves him off. “We will keep it short. It’s Daehwi’s fault that Jaehwan is like that.”

“Daehwi did this?” Seongwoo cocks his head to the side. “You’re kidding right?”

“No, it – it was my fault,” Daehwi admits, his usually cool and collected image thrown out of the window as he shyly scratches his chin and grimaces. “You see my family has a long tradition of… witchcraft…. I wasn’t properly trained so when I don’t pay attention or drink a bit of alcohol, I sometimes do stupid stuff like this.”

“Wait, wait, wait, witchcraft?” Jisung flails around with his arms. “You’re telling me you’re a wizard?”

“Not exactly a wizard since, like I said, I didn’t get the proper training for it but yes?” Daehwi answers, slowly nodding his head. “I normally don’t use it or put curses on people though, so don’t worry.”

“You must be kidding me,” Daniel says. “Magic – I thought it was only possible in movies!”

“Surprise?” Daehwi shrugs with a small smile.

Woojin rolls his eyes and slaps Daehwi’s shoulder which earns him a glare from Daehwi.

Seongwoo doesn’t know whether he should be laughing or crying or start looking for cameras in his apartment because this has to be a fucking prank – Jaehwan being a baby is bad enough but now he is also being told that magic and witches and all that jazz exist.

“Anyway, since this has happened a few times before, with different kinds of spells, we know it’s probably only going to last about a month,” Woojin informs them. “He will probably turn back to normal on his own, he should be glad he wasn’t turned into a toad like the last guy.”

“Last guy?” Minhyun asks.

“It’s a very long story,” Daehwi laughs nervously. “All you need to know is that he is alive and well.”

“We will be going now, thank you for letting us explain,” Woojin stands up and tugs Daehwi up with him. “I hope Jaehwan won’t make it too difficult for you – and please don’t stop inviting us to your parties, they’re all very fun.”

“Very fun because you can keep flirting with Jihoon, right?” Daehwi smirks.

Woojin glares at him before pulling Daehwi back to the entrance and leaving, shouting a “we are sorry” over his shoulder one last time.

The four of them don’t talk – or move – for a while.

Jaehwan is the only one who does. He goes, takes out some Legos out of his toy basket, that Minhyun had just brought over so that they’re able to keep the house more organized, and starts playing with them like nothing out of the ordinary is happening.

“Do you think, that if witches and wizards already exist, Hogwarts exists too?” Daniel asks all of a sudden.

Seongwoo almost chokes on how much he has to laugh.

  


“You guys should sleep,” Jisung suggests while looking between Daniel and Seongwoo. “We will take Jaehwan out for the afternoon, maybe even until late into the night, so you should use it to rest.”

“Don’t you dare to bring him home past 8 p.m. he has a set bedtime and he can’t miss it,” Seongwoo warns sternly.

“What are you? His mom?” Sungwoon snorts.

“Uh, duh, I have been taking care of him for the past few weeks,” Seongwoo says. “I might as well be his mom while he is a little kid. Daniel is the second mom while you guys are all just plain boring uncles.”

“I’d rather be an uncle than look like I haven’t slept in forty-five years,” Minhyun deadpans.

“Shut up, Seongwoo looks perfectly fine, stop teasing him, he will start thinking he looks like a zombie or something,” Daniel butts in. “Don’t you see how pretty he is?”

“You’re so whipped, it’s disgusting,” Jisung says.

“Oh please, as if you’re one to speak,” Daniel retorts. “Anyway, are you leaving or not?”

“Yes, yes, we are leaving, don’t worry your pretty little head about it,” Sungwoon responds instead of Jisung. “Come on, Jaehwan, let’s leave these oldies behind and go do something fun.”

“Yes!” Jaehwan exclaims happily. “Uncle Sungwoon is coolest!”

“Did you hear that bitches? Uncle Sungwoon is the coolest,” Sungwoon cheers happily.

“B-bitches?” Jaehwan copies him.

Both Seongwoo and Daniel look at Sungwoon, who is having the laughing fit of his life, disapprovingly.

“That’s a bad word, Jaehwan, don’t listen to Sungwoon,” Minhyun corrects him. “Now let’s put on your shoes and go to the park. Seongwoo and Daniel told us you really like the sandpit, are you going to play there today too?”

“Yes, I ‘ill make big castle!” Jaehwan giggles happily. “My gift to you!”

“Oh, really? That’s so nice of you,” Minhyun smiles gently. “Can I help you build it?”

Minhyun and Jaehwan keep talking about the castle even until they’re out of the door. Seongwoo looks worriedly while his friends and Jaehwan leave, feeling worry bubble inside of him.

“They will be fine, right?” Seongwoo asks.

“Of course, they will have no problem,” Daniel replies with a grin. “Let’s go catch up on some sleep?”

  


Seongwoo, like countless of times, wakes up with his face pressed to Daniel’s chest, Daniel’s arms and legs wrapped around his body as he hugs him tightly in his sleep.

He wonders how this can happen every single time – they fall asleep on different ends of the bed, most often than not Jaehwan is in between them, but they still always wake up in each other’s arms, sharing the same blanket and Seongwoo’s head pillowed on Daniel’s chest.

Seongwoo isn’t complaining though.

Daniel’s chest is pretty comfortable and even though it’s winter, it can get cold at night, so Daniel’s extra warmth is always welcomed.

And he also has to admit, that he wouldn’t mind doing this more often, even after Jaehwan is back to normal. He had already had several mental breakdowns over this – more often than not they were triggered by Daniel being cheesy or especially affectionate towards Seongwoo – and he has come to the conclusion that he might be a tiny bit gay for his best friend.

Though nothing is confirmed, Seongwoo thinks of it as only a theory as of yet.

It would make sense though, if he really was in love with Daniel.

It would explain why his heart starts beating faster every time Daniel’s face is too close to his or when Daniel smiles at him that cute bunny smile of his.

The theory would also very much explain why his browser history is full of random google searches like “why do I want to hold my best friend’s hand?” or “is it normal to want your best friend to marry you?” or “I kissed my best friend’s forehead, what the fuck does this mean?”. He is pretty sure there is also “I think my best friend’s hands are absolutely beautiful and I think I’m in love” in there.

Seongwoo thinks it’s a nice theory too.

Or at least it would be nice if Daniel felt the same way, too, if Daniel also was as head over heels for him as he is for him.

If not, well, then it’d actually be a pretty scary theory.

Seongwoo traces Daniel’s features with his features, from his pretty eyebrows down his nose and his cheeks until his index finger stops at Daniel’s lips. He looks at them for a while, enjoying how soft they feel underneath his finger.

He wishes he could lean in, close the distance between them and not have to care about the consequences.

But alas, he can’t.

If he does and Daniel doesn’t reciprocate his feelings, their almost 20 years of friendship would all go down the drain, all of their happy memories forgotten only to be replaced by bad ones.

“Stop thinking,” Daniel mumbles.

Seongwoo stares up at him in shock and immediately removes his finger from Daniel’s lips, hoping that Daniel was still half-asleep and hadn’t noticed what he had been doing.

“Your thinking is waking me up, it’s too loud so you have to stop thinking,” Daniel whines and nuzzles into Seongwoo’s hair.

“Bullshit,” Seongwoo laughs. “How can thinking even be loud?”

“I don’t know but it just is,” Daniel answers, Seongwoo finds it really cute how he can feel Daniel pouting against his skin. “Now stop thinking and please go back to sleep.”

“Okay,” Seongwoo sighs softly.

He closes his eyes, willing all of his doubts and thoughts to disappear, and scoots closer to Daniel, fisting Daniel’s shirt in his hand as he tries to fall asleep.

**Day 24**

Daniel and Seongwoo have their arms wide open as they are sitting down on the floor. Jaehwan is a few meters away from them, looking between the two of them as he purses his lips.

“Jaehwan,” Seongwoo calls out, making grabby hands. “Come to me!”

“No, come to me!” Daniel protests.

It takes a few more seconds before Jaehwan finally runs towards them. Seongwoo smirks as Jaehwan is definitely walking towards him. He smiles at Jaehwan and keeps on trying to win him over while Daniel makes silly faces and shouts Jaehwan’s name in different volumes.

Jaehwan is only a meter away from Seongwoo when suddenly Daniel’s loud “Jaehwan is a cutie!” catches his attention and he quickly changes his mind, running to Daniel and jumping in his arms.

Seongwoo looks incredulously at the both of them.

“I can’t believe he likes you more than me!” Seongwoo pouts.

Daniel only shrugs before he keeps kissing and tickling Jaehwan, who looks absolutely pleased with himself. Seongwoo huffs and puffs to get his attention but it’s to no avail.

“Stop – stop doing that,” Daniel tells him with a frown when he finally stops playing with Jaehwan.

“Stop what?”

“That – that lip thing,” Daniel gestures to Seongwoo with his chin.

“What do you mean?” Seongwoo blinks up innocently at him and pouts again as a form of revenge, how can Jaehwan really like Daniel better? After all that Seongwoo’s done for him. “I’m not doing anything though.”

“Jaehwan baby, don’t you think it’s time to out for a walk now?” Daniel smiles sweetly at Jaehwan, completely ignoring Seongwoo.

“Don’t leave me alone!” Seongwoo protests.

“Jaehwan, please tell him it’s his fault for being a brat,” Daniel tells Jaehwan.

“Ddeongwoo’s fault!” Jaehwan repeats after Daniel.

“But Daniel,” Seongwoo pouts once more and tugs on Daniel’s arm. “Don’t leave me alone…”

“Jaehwan,” Daniel says after staring at Seongwoo for way longer than necessary. “Let’s go!”

He rushes out of the living room with Jaehwan in his arms and tries to put on his shoes as quickly as possible. Seongwoo laughs and rushes after them, also putting on his shoes. Daniel bends down to pick up Jaehwan’s shoes and is out of the door just as Seongwoo finishes putting his sneakers on.

“Wait for me, you asshole!” Seongwoo yells, running down the corridor.

“Asshole!” Jaehwan shrieks happily in the middle of the hall, still in Daniel’s arms as Seongwoo chases after them.

**Day 29**

“We should do something special for him.”

Seongwoo looks up from where he is sitting on the floor with Jaehwan, both of them have a Barbie in their hand and are playing around.

“What do you mean?” Seongwoo cocks his head to the side in confusion.

“Well, he’s turning back into the normal Jaehwan soon,” Daniel licks his lips. “It feels wrong to just let the last day pass by and to not do anything special.”

“I had forgotten,” Seongwoo admits, looking down at the floor. “I had really forgotten that he’d turn back to adult Jaehwan. I was just expecting him to stay and for Jaehwan to pop in the middle of dinner one day, saying ‘hi bitches, I’m back, did you miss me?’. We would all be confused and ask ourselves why there are suddenly two Jaehwans.”

“Yeah…” Daniel laughs.

They stay silent for a while, both too immersed in their own thoughts.

Seongwoo had truthfully forgotten about all of this being over soon – he had forgotten that everything would return to normal. He wouldn’t wake up cuddled up to Daniel, he wouldn’t get to come home after work to Daniel – and Jaehwan – waiting for him, he wouldn’t have any excuse to have Daniel stay over at his apartment every night.

He can’t help but smile bitterly at the thought.

“Let’s take him to an amusement park,” Seongwoo suggests when he catches Daniel’s eyes. “He will love it.”

**Day 31**

“We are here!” Jaehwan exclaims excitedly as they enter the amusement park.

He is holding onto one of Seongwoo’s hands and one of Daniel’s, tugging at them both because he obviously wants to go and explore everything, his eager eyes taking everything in. Seongwoo looks around, too, fascinated by all the different colors and the amount of people visiting the park on a Wednesday morning.

“Jaehwan,” Minhyun calls out from besides Seongwoo. “You always have to hold hands with one of us or else you could get lost and we don’t want that, okay?”

He bops his little head up and down and then proceeds to drag them to the first ride.

Daniel accompanies him into it, cheering and waving at the camera whenever the carousel passes by their side. Jaehwan likes it so much that he insists he wants to ride it again and really, who are they to say no to him?

Minhyun rides it with him this time and Jaehwan clings tightly onto him. Instead of paying attention at the ride, he pays more attention to Minhyun’s face, poking it and “awing” every once in a while.

Seongwoo is sure adult Jaehwan will love the video he just took.

Then they move to a very slow and uneventful rollercoaster. The four of them fake scream every time Jaehwan yells and lifts his hands up, just because his reaction is way too cute and the face he makes whenever he hears them scream is seriously adorable.

 

“Let’s go buy some headbands!” Jisung yells excitedly when they pass by the shop.

Jaehwan is easily convinced today and so he follows after him with his tiny, chubby legs and drags both, Daniel and him, along.

“What do you guys think would fit Jaehwan the best?” Jisung asks as he looks through all of the available options, his hand stopping on a frog headband before he decides against it and opts for one with a cute little red bow. “Do you like this?”

Jaehwan nods but as soon as Jisung tries to put it on, he screeches and runs away, hiding behind one of Daniel’s legs.

“No! For you!” Jaehwan says, pouting at Jisung.

“Oh, do you want me to wear it?” Jaehwan nods and smiles when Jaehwan puts it on his head. “Do I look pretty? I do, right? Want to pick some out for the others, too?”

Jaehwan hesitates for a second before he goes to Jisung and takes his hand, happily blabbering gibberish and pointing at around ten different headbands he seems to like. Seongwoo laughs too, somehow Jaehwan’s happiness is contagious, and starts to walk around the little shop, too, yelping contently when he sees some nice black kitty ears.

“How do I look?” he says after he finally finds one of his friends – a.k.a. Daniel – after roaming around half the store with the kitty headband on. “Miau!”

“Aw, what a pretty little kitten,” Daniel chuckles at him and pets his head. Seongwoo plays along and leans into the touch, surprising Daniel. He does it for a while more before he proceeds to act as if he is scratching Seongwoo’s chin, making Seongwoo giggles.

“Kitty!” Jaehwan exclaims, running to Seongwoo. “Ddeongwoo is pretty! Prettiest!”

“Really? Thank you so much, Jaehwan,” Seongwoo squats down and ruffles Jaehwan’s hair affectionately. “Do you want to pick one too now? What about you choose one of your favourite animal, huh? Do you have a favourite animal, Jaehwan?”

“Favorite…” his face scrunches up in concentration. “Lion!”

Jaehwan imitates a lion roar and Seongwoo and Daniel immediately coo at him.

“We will search for a lion headband, then,” Daniel states and leaves a big, wet kiss on Jaehwan’s cheek.

Seongwoo nods and spreads his arms, Jaehwan instantly wraps his tiny one around Seongwoo’s neck so that Seongwoo can pick him up more easily.

They make two rounds around the whole store – squinting during the second one because they can’t seem to find the damn lion headbands – ere Seongwoo has enough and asks one of the sale assistants where to find them.

The lady points at the wall directly behind them and smiles politely, wishing them a good day.

“There are a lot to choose from,” Daniel points out. He comes closer to Jaehwan and Seongwoo and then rests his chin on top of Seongwoo’s shoulder, his arm wrapping around Seongwoo’s other one as he gently pokes Jaehwan’s cheeks – Seongwoo’s heart begins to thunder against his chest when he notices their close proximity. “Is there one that has caught your eyes, Jaehwan?”

Jaehwan looks through them all and then points at the smallest pair of ears at the end of the shelf.

Daniel removes himself from Seongwoo, who seems to be finally able to breathe properly again and goes to fetch them. He is about to come back when Jaehwan stops him with his wildly flailing hands.

“And those, too!” Jaehwan demands. “Jaehwan is small lion, Daniel big!”

“What about me?” Seongwoo protests, faking to be hurt by Jaehwan not wanting him to wear the same thing. “Will I be lonely forever now?”

“No!” Jaehwan shakes his head and clings onto Seongwoo. He tries to muffle his giggles with Jaehwan’s tiny jeans jacket but it isn’t very successful. “Ddeongwoo lion, too! Ddeongwoo always with Jaehwan!”

“Okay, okay,” Seongwoo pats his back reassuringly. “We will always stay together, I promise.”

“Now, Jaehwan, what lion headband do you want for Seongwoo? The big one or the small one?” Daniel asks, showing both of the different ears to Jaehwan.

Jaehwan decides that Seongwoo should wear the big ones, too, saying that he has to match with Daniel – or at least that is what Seongwoo understands. They head towards the cashier afterwards and pay for the items while waiting to catch sight of Minhyun and Jisung somewhere.

They see them about two minutes later when Jisung drags Minhyun towards them and screams about how cute the three of them look.

“Almost like a family,” Jisung murmurs. “Now let me take a picture of you!”

In the end, it somehow turns into a photo-shoot as Jaehwan, Daniel and he decide to do the weirdest of poses together.

  


“I am hungry,” Daniel whines after another hour of riding toddler rollercoasters and the bumper cars.

“Me too,” Jisung agrees.

Seongwoo nods and Minhyun hums in agreement. The four of them then turn to Jaehwan, who is looking between all of the rides and them, probably trying to decide between the two. He takes one last look at the bumper cars and then sighs.

“Food,” Jaehwan nods.

  


“Okay, maybe eating three cheeseburgers wasn’t a good idea,” Daniel groans when he is done.

Jaehwan giggles at his pained expression from where he is sitting on Seongwoo’s lap and playing with the toy he had gotten along with the kid’s menu.

“Of course, it wasn’t,” Minhyun deadpans. “Did you really think it would do you well?”

“Let me live,” Daniel protests with a pout. “I was hungry, okay? Who would have thought that the cheeseburgers were going to be even bigger than your head, am I right?”

“Hey, leave his head out of this,” Jisung warns. “It’s not like you can talk anyway.”

“You shouldn’t be talking either,” Seongwoo reminds him.

Jisung glares at him and rolls his eyes, grumbling under his breath about how Seongwoo shouldn’t get involved in big headed people’s business. Seongwoo just sticks his tongue out.

They stay silent for a while, the only one who talks is Jaehwan, who sometimes interrupts their after-food sleepiness with happy shrieks or short sentences like “I’m gonna fight table!” or “this toy is ‘tupid!”.

“What rides do we have left on the list?” Daniel suddenly asks Seongwoo.

He has his arm on the table and his chin propped up on his hand as he looks at Seongwoo – his position makes him look soft, thanks to his squished cheeks, but also really hot because Seongwoo can get peek into his shirt and see his collarbones and God knows he is a sucker for those.

“The only thing we have on the ride left on the list is the parade that is in like half an hour and the teacups ride thingy,” Seongwoo answers when he snaps out of his Daniel-induced daze.

“We can rest for twenty more minutes and then go to the parade, right?”

Seongwoo considers Daniel’s statement, then shrugs and nods. It will probably help all of them, especially Jaehwan, to digest their food some more before riding on the teacups.

“I will use you as my pillow then,” Daniel announces.

Minhyun and Jisung look confused at him for a minute before they go back to their own conversation.

Daniel scoots closer to Seongwoo with his chair before he loops an arm around Seongwoo’s and tries to make himself comfortable on Seongwoo’s shoulder, whining when he can’t find a comfortable enough position.

Seongwoo stares at him astonished and wide-eyed.

He doesn’t know what has gotten into Daniel today but he has been more touchy than normal – before Jaehwan even happened the both of them would at most hug once in a while but now, in just one day, and even when Jaehwan was with them, he’d mostly do it when they were both asleep, their bodies doing things without their consent (Seongwoo ignores the forehead kiss incident because that, too, was not necessarily out of his own free will, he still can’t believe his body had made him booboo the fool).

But now, Daniel is hugging Seongwoo’s arm and pillowing his head on Seongwoo’s shoulder, in front of their friends, and Seongwoo can feel his heart about to start hammering out of his chest.

He kind of loves it, loves how warm Daniel feels, loves how he could easily shuffle a bit to accommodate Daniel better on his shoulder and start to gently caress his hair, how he could act like they do this all the time, like this is their reality and not just a passing moment in both of their lives.

He, however, also kind of hates it, hates it because it makes him hopeful, makes him wonder if Daniel might feel the same, makes him wonder if they could stay like this even after Jaehwan turns back.

“Ddeongwoo, juice?” Jaehwan asks.

Seongwoo shoots him a strained smile and carefully proceeds to reach out for the juice, handing it to Jaehwan and making sure that the straw is facing in the proper direction.

“Thanks!” Jaehwan says cheerily before drinking noisily out of the juice carton.

“You’re welcome, buddy,” he answers.

Then he looks back at Daniel, who has his eyes closed and is seemingly asleep on his shoulder and can’t help the fondness that bubbles inside of him.

He suddenly has the urge to kiss Daniel so he side-eyes Minhyun and Jisung and makes sure that they are not paying attention to him before he sneakily kisses the top of Daniel’s head. Daniel stirs a bit, squeezing Seongwoo’s arms and then relaxing again against Seongwoo.

“Good night kiss?” Seongwoo startles when Jaehwan looks at him curiously. “Good night kiss for Niel?”

“Something like that,” Seongwoo nods.

  


The parade is actually a lot more fun than Seongwoo had expected it to be.

Jaehwan sits on top of Daniel’s shoulders while Daniel holds tightly onto his hands, making him dance along to the music whenever one of the dressed-up worker or mascots come to them. Minhyun and Jisung surprisingly know a lot of the children songs that are being played and after Minhyun warms up, they start singing them at the top of their lungs.

As Seongwoo observes the four of them, he feels so utterly happy.

  


“Again!” Jaehwan demands.

Seongwoo passes him off to Jaehwan as he stumbles to the nearest bench, feeling like he is going to throw up if he moves even a millimeter more. Daniel, who had also been on the demonic ride that are the teacups, slumps down next to Seongwoo, breathing heavily.

“No way,” Seongwoo shakes his head.

He immediately regrets doing that, feeling another wave of nausea overwhelming it. Seongwoo has changed his mind. He is not happy, he is not happy at all.

“But – But I want!” Jaehwan yells, his lips wobbling as he starts to kick around in Jisung’s embrace.

“Uncle Jisung and Minhyun will ride with you this time,” Daniel says, both, Jisung and Minhyun almost seem to get whiplash at how fast they turn their heads to glare at Daniel. “Seongwoo and I already did it, it’s your turn now.”

“Enjoy your death,” Seongwoo smiles sweetly at them.

Jaehwan wiggles his way out of Jisung’s arms and then takes a hold of Minhyun’s hand. He tugs at it so harshly that Minhyun almost loses his balance before he takes off in a sprint, a flustered Minhyun following behind him.

Jisung gives him the stink eye one last time before he rushes after the both of them.

“I’m so glad we don’t actually have to go on there again,” Daniel sighs in relief. “I’m pretty sure I would have puked in the middle of the ride.”

“We would have had a beautiful vomit duet,” Seongwoo laughs.

It takes a while for everything to stop spinning but when it does, he sighs in relief. Daniel seems to be feeling better after a few minutes too, judging from the way he snaps a few pictures of Minhyun, Jisung and Jaehwan entering one of the tea cups.

They silently watch the ride start off.

Jaehwan already has his hands up in the air as Jisung holds tightly onto him with one arm and onto the rim of the cup. Minhyun is also holding onto Jaehwan but he seems to be faring better than Jisung, what with how he is laughing hysterically along with Jaehwan.

“I will miss this.”

Seongwoo doesn’t know why he suddenly says it, why he brings it up. Daniel looks like he is startled too before he regains his composure.

“Yeah, me too,” he agrees easily enough. “I will miss Jaehwan not being a pain in the ass 24/7.”

“That, too, but it’s not the only thing I will miss,” Seongwoo replies as he worries on his lips. “I’m actually glad that Jaehwan is going to be an adult again, I don’t think my wallet could have dealt with another month of having to feed him. His stomach truly is an endless pit.”

Daniel laughs along with him for a few seconds but then they go back to silently looking at the teacups turning. Seongwoo thinks he even catches a glimpse of Jaehwan making Jisung “woo”.

“What will you miss the most then?” Daniel asks, turning his head to look at Seongwoo.

“You.”

He doesn’t look at Daniel, doesn’t really dare to because where the fuck did that come from? Seongwoo knows it’s the truth, knows that he now can definitely say that he is head over heels in love with Daniel but he had no plan of actually telling him, of confessing.

Seongwoo, if he could, should really invest on a new brain-to-mouth filter.

“I’m not going to disappear from your life though,” Daniel smiles brightly, scooting closer to Seongwoo. “And nothing will change between us after Jaehwan gets back to normal, we will stay as the best friends who sometimes have movie marathons until the crack of down and get black out drunk together.”

He licks his lips nervously.

Seongwoo knows this is his chance to back out, to pretend like that’s exactly what he had meant and play along with Daniel. But somehow, the thought of not telling Daniel how he feels suddenly, for no apparent reason, seems even scarier than telling him.

“That’s not what I meant,” Seongwoo starts carefully.

Daniel cocks his head to the side and comes even closer, his eyebrows furrowing as he looks at Seongwoo with pursed lips.

“What did you mean then?”

“I…” Seongwoo takes a deep breathe before gathering all of his courage and looking at Daniel. “I will miss coming from work and seeing you there, sleeping on the couch or playing your stupid mobile games on the floor. I will miss making you dinner every day and I will miss being able to eat with you while talking about the stupidest things. I will miss going to bed with you and waking up with – with you hugging me. I will just miss you. Everything that you do, everything that you are, I will miss it. I will miss all of it.”

Daniel visibly gulps and Seongwoo?

Well, Seongwoo can feel a blush forming on his cheeks as all the courage he had just seconds ago is replaced by pure and utter embarrassment.

After a few seconds, the silence becomes too deafening for Seongwoo so he clears his throat and turns away from Daniel. He looks at Jaehwan, who, even after the ride has stopped, is cheering loudly in his seat.

The laughter – out of embarrassment, fondness and maybe desperation – that was to bubble out of him dies down when Daniel cups his cheeks and turns his head around.

“What are you doing?” Seongwoo asks with a frown and pout on his face.

Daniel doesn’t verbally answer but he does lean in and kiss Seongwoo softly on his lips. Seongwoo’s eyes flutter closed as his hands wander to hold onto Daniel’s and he kisses him back just as gently, enjoying the chasteness of the kiss.

“We could… We could just stay how we are right now?” Daniel suggests, licking his lips once more, after he pulls apart from the kiss and rests his forehead on Seongwoo’s. “Because I – I feel exactly the same way as you. I don’t want to… I don’t want to stop this, whatever this is.”

“Can we?” Seongwoo blinks.

“We can,” Daniel nods, a smile blooming on his face. He pecks Seongwoo again on the lips, making him giggle. “We can also change some things, you know?”

“For example?” Seongwoo questions after kissing Daniel once more.

“We could kiss now, hold hands, cuddle on the couch and all that jazz,” Daniel laughs as he takes his hands off of Seongwoo’s cheeks and intertwines their fingers instead. “We could be… boyfriends?”

“Boyfriends?” Seongwoo echoes. “I – yes, I’d like that.”

“Good,” Daniel smiles.

Seongwoo mirrors Daniel’s bright smile before he throws himself into Daniel’s arms, giggling happily as he nuzzles into Daniel’s neck. Daniel wraps his arms tightly around Seongwoo and laughs too, he sounds just as giddy and happy as Seongwoo feels and Seongwoo thinks it’s the cutest thing.

“I can’t believe it took Jaehwan turning into a baby for you guys to get together,” Jisung’s voice interrupts their little bubble. “You’re idiots.”

Daniel and Seongwoo only glare at him and don’t answer, too happy to care about anything else.

  


“Did you have fun today, Jaehwan?” Seongwoo asks as he tucks Jaehwan in before slipping under the sheets with him.

“Yeah, lots!” Jaehwan answers happily. “But I’m ‘ired!”

“Then you should go to sleep,” Daniel laughs from where he is lying on Jaehwan’s other side. “You know sleeping is important. You have to sleep a lot to be as big as us!”

Jaehwan doesn’t say anything more and closes his eyes.

Seongwoo leans down and presses what he guesses is the last good night kiss on Jaehwan’s head. Daniel follows suit with a small smile, however, his smile vanishes when Seongwoo lies back down on the pillow.

“What about me?” Daniel pouts.

“Hm?” Seongwoo asks, pretending not to know what Daniel wants. “What about you?”

“Don’t I get my good night kiss, too?”

Seongwoo can’t resist to kiss him when Daniel is looking at him with his big puppy eyes and he is still feeling to giddy about now being able to call Daniel his boyfriend, so he props himself up on his elbow and leans over Jaehwan to press a gentle kiss on Daniel’s lips.

“Good night, Daniel,” he whispers.

Daniel manages to find Seongwoo’s hand under the shits and he interlocks their fingers.

“Good night, Seongwoo.”

**Day 0**

Seongwoo wakes up in the morning to the scent of Daniel’s cologne tingling in his nose. He sighs contently and snuggles further into Daniel’s chest, loving how he can freely hug him now.

“Morning,” Daniel yawns, kissing the crown of Seongwoo’s head.

“Good morning,” Seongwoo replies and looks up at Daniel, who is rubbing the sleep out of his eyes with his hand. “You look cute.”

Daniel snorts and looks down at him – it makes him look funny, what with the double chin he develops and how he is almost crossed-eye as he tries to look Seongwoo in the eyes. Seongwoo giggles and scoots a little further back so that he can properly see Daniel’s face.

“You’re the one who looks cute here, tsk,” Daniel laughs and leans down to press a gentle kiss on Seongwoo’s lips. “I can’t believe my boyfriend is this adorable even just after waking up.”

“I should be saying that,” Seongwoo grins.

He chases after Daniel lips and kisses him again, humming contently into it as Daniel caresses his back with soft and careful fingers.

Their kiss is cut short when they feel someone kicking their legs.

They separate for a moment and turn towards Jaehwan, who is now back to having an adult body as he tosses and turns in Seongwoo’s bed, before they look at each other again and just giggle – the thought of having to explain to Jaehwan everything that had gone down while he was a baby making him laugh even louder.

“Do you want to get some breakfast?” Daniel says.

“Sure,” Seongwoo giggles. “But only if you give me a kiss before we go to the kitchen.”

Daniel happily obliges to Seongwoo’s request before he stands up and waits for Seongwoo to do so too in order to take a hold of his hand and intertwine their fingers together. He brings it up to his mouth and kisses it gently, making Seongwoo giggle giddily.

“I love you,” Daniel smiles as they walk to the kitchen.

“I love you even more,” Seongwoo laughs.

 

**Author's Note:**

> hello guys! 
> 
> first of all i want to apologize to all of the sos members and all the readers for posting this super, super late. it just turned into a monster and i.... yeah, i just want to say i am very sorry! 
> 
> and then i want to thank k for taking the time to read through this, ily and thank you! 
> 
> this is the first part of s.o.s.' freestyle week! how did you like? any guesses of who could have written this? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
> 
> please look forward to the rest of the s.o.s.' members work and thank you so much for reading through this mess. 
> 
> if you want to leave us comments on our fics or guesses on who you think could have written each fic, you can find us here:  
> \- [twitter](https://twitter.com/ongnielsos?lang=en)  
> \- [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/ongnielsos)
> 
> comments, kudos, feedback and guesses are very much appreciated!


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